


Beating the Odds

by lauraeb5



Category: Alex Rider - Anthony Horowitz, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Found Family, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Implied/Referenced Torture, It's pretty dark, No Romance, yeah - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-30
Updated: 2020-12-03
Packaged: 2021-03-03 19:14:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 25,570
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24990622
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lauraeb5/pseuds/lauraeb5
Summary: Alex never wanted to be a spy. But no one ever cared what he wanted. After years of being used, Alex finds a chance to get out when he meets the Avengers. But Alex's employers aren't willing to let him go.
Relationships: Alex Rider & Clint Barton, Alex Rider & the Avengers
Comments: 46
Kudos: 183





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! Heads up, this is a very dark look at the Alex Rider series. This story is majorly AU, with Alex having been a spy since he was 11 years old. Also, his uncle was way more terrible than in the original series. So this Alex isn’t the Alex we see in the original series. This Alex has been through multiple hells, and is willing to do whatever it takes to survive.
> 
> Don’t let that scare you off though! The darkest aspects will mostly be alluded to, nothing too graphic. Though Alex is going to be pretty much a one man army in this, so a lot of goons are going to be wasted. Fun!

Alex stared at the ceiling of his cell. He wasn’t too concerned about his current imprisonment. These people were clearly underestimating him. They hadn’t even searched him before throwing him in this cell. If Alex had to guess, he would say they thought he was just a nosy kid who had gotten in over his head. At least, he hoped that’s what they thought. He had gone to a lot of effort to make it seem that way, and it would be disappointing if all that work went to waste. 

Alex shifted on his cot. It was remarkably comfortable. These terrorists were really quite considerate, for terrorists. Hopefully he wouldn’t have to kill very many of them. After all, he wasn’t here to shut them down. He just needed to retrieve something. If he was lucky, he’d be able to get out with minimal casualties. 

He glanced at his watch. This was exactly what he was talking about. They hadn’t even taken his watch away. That was bad guy etiquette 101. Though in their defense, it wasn’t very obvious that it contained a high grade tracker and communication device. Alex wasn’t interested in those features at the moment, however. He legitimately wanted to know what time it was. He would make his move once night hit. The fewer people in the building, the better. 

Reassured that it would still be a few hours before he should act, Alex went back to staring at the ceiling. Now it was just a waiting game. He was good at those.

A loud explosion shocked Alex into action. He leapt off the bed, running to the front of the cell. He peered out of the bars, curious to see what had caused the explosion. He still wasn’t worried. Chaos would only work in his favor. But he would like to know what was going on. Lack of information could be deadly, and Alex really didn’t want to end up a casualty of some hostile takeover or civil war.

Looking down the hallway, Alex saw a band of goons rushing toward someone, only for something to fly through the air, knocking them all out. Alex frowned. That had looked like a shield. But the only person he knew of that fought with a shield was…

Almost as if his thoughts had summoned him, Captain America walked into view. Alex’s mouth fell open. He had to fight back laughter. Of course the bloody Avengers would raid this compound at the same time he was supposed to be infiltrating it. Why not, right? It made about as much sense as everything else in his life.

Captain America began to walk toward his cell, and Alex thought fast. There was no way he could hide from the First Avenger. The man would see him for sure. Alex shrugged mentally. Well, this wasn’t the original plan, but he could make it work. Who knows, it might even be fun.

“Hello?” he called, purposely making his voice quiver. “Is anyone there? Please help me!”

Suddenly Captain America was in front of his cell, looking at him. Alex whistled in his head, being sure to keep a scared expression on his face. The man was an impressive specimen, that was for sure. Tall, handsome, buff, he really pulled off the ‘wholesome American hero’ thing he had going on. Exactly the kind of guy who would do anything for a scared little kid. This would be easy. 

“Oh thank goodness! Please, I just want to go home! Can you help me?” Alex let a few tears fall, and smirked inwardly when the Captain’s face softened. Hook, line, and sinker. 

“It will be okay.” the man assured, and honestly, could he be more perfect? His voice was deep and traditionally ‘manly’ while still holding just the right amount of softness to calm scared civilians. A super soldier indeed. Those scientists back in the day may have been onto something. 

“Step back.” Captain America directed, and Alex moved back obligingly. He watched curiously as the Captain smashed the lock with his shield, completely destroying it. Well, that was one way to do it. Alex would have been a bit more subtle, but whatever. Subtly was kind of out the window at this point. Time to do what he did best: improvise.

“Thank you! I know I shouldn’t have tried to break in, but my friends dared me, and we thought the building was abandoned, honest! I never would have done it otherwise!”

This was more or less the same story that Alex had fed the men who had ‘captured’ him, and he saw no reason to deviate from a perfectly good lie. He knew his cover would be blown sooner or later, but he figured it might as well be latter. Besides, the longer he strung the Captain along, the funnier it would be when he finally showed what he was capable of. 

“It’s okay. I’ll get you out safe. Just stick close, alright?”

Alex nodded earnestly, moving to stand next to the Captain. The man put a hand to his ear, and Alex realized that he was contacting his team.

“Guys, I found a civilian in the cells. I’m going to get him out. You all good?”

Alex couldn’t hear the response, but he assumed it was positive, because the Captain proceeded to move toward the closest exist. Alex followed behind dutifully, looking for a good opportunity to break away.

That opportunity came as they were crossing a large room, filled with various desks and cubicles. It must have been where the analysts worked. They had just started across, when gunfire broke out.

Captain America swore, dropping to the ground, dragging Alex with him. He pulled over a nearby desk, taking cover behind it. 

Alex glanced around the desk, taking in the situation. Five men had taken up position across the room. They must have entered from the opposite side of the room, determined to catch the Captain off-guard. It hadn’t worked, but they were pretty well pinned down at this point. Well, they appeared to be, at least. The men knew that the Captain wouldn’t risk a civilian life by attacking them, so they thought they had the situation under control. What they didn’t know was that the ‘civilian’ was the one they should be scared of. 

Alex looked at the Captain, who was calling his teammates for aid. He weighed his options, before he decided that he was done pretending to be helpless. Besides, he couldn’t leave the building without getting what he had been sent to retrieve. Sticking with the Captain would not help him accomplish that goal. 

Decision made, he dropped the terrified expression. The Captain must have been more observant than Alex had thought, because he immediately noticed the change in body language. He looked at Alex strangely, clearly unnerved by this abrupt shift.

Alex grinned at him, offering a two fingered salute.

“Well, this has been fun, but I’ve got stuff to do. Thanks for breaking me out Cap! It’s been a blast!”

And with that, Alex exploded into action. 

He popped up from behind the desk, throwing two knives one after the other with deadly speed and accuracy. He was moving before the knives hit their targets, running toward the men at full speed. His knives hit almost instantaneously, taking out the two farthest men. He slid under a desk that was in his way, taking him out a range of the bullets that were fired haphazardly in his direction as the terrorists recovered from their shock. Alex rolled to his feet in front of the lead man, transferring his momentum into a roundhouse kick that dropped the man to floor, unconscious. As the man fell, Alex grabbed the gun from his suddenly slack grip, turning it on the two remaining men. Two headshots later, all the terrorists were down, leaving the room eerily silent. 

Alex waved cheerily at the shocked Captain, before sprinting from the room, heading for the main control room of the facility. He could hear the Captain chasing after him, but he was able to lose him without too much trouble. Alex had studied the blueprints of this place before he made his assault, so it was easy for him to make his way toward the control room while avoiding any guards or random Avengers. 

Alex smiled as he took a small detour to avoid a rampaging Hulk. Who knew that this mission would turn out to be so interesting?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Hawkeye cursed, ducking behind a large crate. Who had designed this place? His job was to get into the control room and shut down Hydra’s communication. Unfortunately, the control room could only be accessed by going through a large warehouse type space that was filled with crates and guards. Hawkeye was pretty sure that the crates were full of weapons, but that wasn’t exactly his main concern at the moment. He had made it across the room unmolested, but the final distance to the control room was empty, except of course for the large number of armed men filling it. There was no way he could make his way across unseen, and the moment he started firing, his position would be given away. He was royally screwed. 

He was still trying to figure out his next move when the Captain’s voice distracted him.

“Guys, I lost the civilian.”

“He’s dead?” Iron Man asked, real fear in his voice.

“Ah, no. But a bunch of Hydra agents are. Honestly, I’m not sure that civilian is the right word to describe him.”

“Wait, you managed to lose a man who is capable of taking down Hydra agents? In the middle of an active combat situation? What were you thinking?” Black Widow did not sound happy. 

“I was thinking that I needed to protect a kid!” Captain America defended. “What was I supposed to think? The kid can’t be older than twelve!”

“Hold on.” Hawkeye said, not sure he had understood. “Are you telling me that a twelve year old kid killed a bunch of Hydra agents under your watch?”

“Well that’s not very nice. I’m fourteen, thank you very much.”

Hawkeye jumped, spinning to see a young boy crouched next to him. He could only assume that this was the child that Cap was talking about. He didn’t look capable of taking down a group of Hydra agents, but he knew that appearances could be deceiving. And looking closer, he could tell that there was more to this kid than it first seemed. He had a grace to him, a subtle confidence that Hawkeye had only seen in seasoned agents. This kid was good, he could tell. 

“I think I found your missing ‘civilian’ Cap.” he said wryly, cutting off the argument that was going on over the coms. The kid grinned.

“Come on, we both know that I found you.” The kid inched forward, looking around the edge of the crate. He whistled quietly upon taking in the scene.

“Oh dear. Now that is a problem. You Avengers couldn’t have waited til tomorrow to attack this place? It would have made my life quite a bit easier.”

The kid moved back, tilting his head to the side as he thought. Finally he sighed, looking resigned. 

“I guess there’s nothing for it. Ah well. What can you do?”

Before Hawkeye could react, the kid pulled out a knife, seemingly from nowhere, and stabbed himself in the arm. 

Hawkeye swore violently, looking at the kid’s blood soaked arm. The kid didn’t react at all to the knife in his arm, pulling it out and looking at the wound speculatively. 

“Nice,” he said with a grin. “Lots of blood for maximum effect, but no real damage to any muscles.”

“Why did you do that!?” Hawkeye finally managed to pull himself together enough to ask the question. He was starting to seriously question the boy’s sanity.

The kid simply winked at him, the lunatic. “It makes the trick easier. It can be done without it, but eh. I’m lazy. Less acting on my part if I’ve got actual blood seeping out of me, you know?”

Hawkeye shook his head, but that didn’t seem to bother the kid. He shrugged, that cheerful grin still on his face.

“Guess it’s just me then. Typical. Anyway, I’m assuming I can count on you for backup? Yes? Great! Let’s do this!”

Before Hawkeye could respond positively or negatively, the kid screamed. His entire demeanor changed in a split second, his face twisted in pain and fear as he staggered out from behind the crate, tears streaming down his face. He clutched his bloody arm, holding it close to his body as if to protect it from further harm. He stumbled toward the stunned guards, sobbing loudly. 

“Please,” he begged, looking at them with terrified eyes. “I don’t know what’s going on, I just want to go home! Please help me!”

Hawkeye’s eyes widened as he suddenly realized what the kid’s ‘trick’ was. The guards were so surprised to be facing an injured child, that they let him get close. At lot closer than they should if what Hawkeye suspected about this kid was true. 

As if he had read his mind, the kid moved. The knife made a reappearance, buried in the chest of the guard that had moved forward, whether to help or hurt, it was unclear. A second knife joined the first as the kid continued his attack, leaving three bodies dead on the ground before anyone could react. 

A cry of alarm went up as the men started to fire on the kid. Hawkeye took that as his cue to join the fight, taking down men that were perilously close to harming the boy. Not that he seemed to need the help. The kid fought with a grace that made it look like he was dancing. Natasha was the only other person he had ever met who could move like that. It was kind of amazing.

Hawkeye grew more and more impressed as he watched the kid fight. He was constantly moving, and had a knack for using his enemies as shields against incoming gunfire. He mostly used his two knives, but he was not above redirecting gunshots, grabbing men’s arms and twisting them to aim at comrades just as they fired. No one could touch him. Punches and kicks aimed at him always missed, and the kid never lost a chance to take advantage of an off balance enemy, slicing tendons and throats without hesitation. With Hawkeye’s help, it wasn’t long before all the Hydra agents were down. 

Hawkeye emerged cautiously from behind the crate, keeping an eye out for unexpected enemies. He approached the kid slowly. He would be lying if he said he wasn’t a little intimidated. He had no clue who this kid was, or what he wanted. All that he knew was that he was a serious combatant, and he did not want to get on his bad side. 

The kid smiled at him. It was a little less charming this time, what with the blood spattered across his face. 

“That was fun.” he said cheerfully. “I haven’t worked with a competent partner in ages.”

Hawkeye raised an eyebrow. “Uh… thanks?”

“You’re welcome!” the kid chirped. He spun around, heading across the room. “Come on! You needed to get into the control room, right?”

Hawkeye stayed where he was, staring after the boy. To be honest, he had no clue what to do. The kid was acting as if nothing unusual had happened, as if the wholesale slaughter that had just happened was normal. Not even he could cause this much death without feeling a little bad, but the kid didn’t seem affected in the least. It was a little worrisome. Hawkeye didn’t really want to be stuck in a small space with a possible psychopath. 

Unfortunately, the kid was right. He did need to get into the control room. Steeling himself, he walked across the room, avoiding the bodies strewn across the floor. He wasn’t surprised to see the door to the control room swinging open, the lock picked. He entered cautiously, looking around.

The first thing that he noticed was the two bodies on the ground, each laying in a pool of growing blood. He looked away, trying to find the kid. 

He spotted him by the main console. Surprisingly, he wasn’t interested in the computers, and was instead looking through different drawers. Just as Hawkeye reached him, he brightened. 

“Here we are!” he said with that same cheery grin on his face. Hawkeye was starting to hate that smile. No one should look that happy while they still had dead men's blood coating their face.

“What is it?” Hawkeye asked, worried that the kid had found a bomb or something. Instead, the boy help up a flash drive.

“A list of agents and their various aliases for most of the world’s intelligence agencies.” The kid shook his finger mockingly. “Not the kind of thing you want to fall into the wrong hands.”

Hawkeye stared at the flash drive in shock. If what the kid said was true, then that could cripple the world’s military defenses, and cause a whole lot of deaths.

“Not to worry!” the kid said. “It is heavily encrypted. There is no chance that they broke through in the time that they had it. So, all’s well that ends well.”

Hawkeye was pretty sure that the dead bodies both in and outside this room would beg to differ, but he let it go. He went over to the main console in the room and shut down Hydra’s communication system. Without being able to communicate, the men wouldn’t be able to coordinate, and it would be much easier for the Avengers to take the rest of them down.

That done, he turned back to the kid, who was sitting in one of the swivel chairs, spinning around. He stopped when he noticed Hawkeye looking at him.

There was silence for a moment as they looked at each other. Hawkeye cleared his throat.

“I have to bring you in. You know that, right?”

The kid stared blankly at him, the smile gone for once. Hawkeye could almost see him weighing his options. He readied himself, convinced that the kid was going to run.

“Okay.” The kid stood up, the smile back again. “But first things first.”

He pulled the flash drive out of his pocket and dropped it on the ground, smashing it with his heel. He smirked at Hawkeye. 

“Like I said. Not the kind of thing you want to fall into the wrong hands.”

Hawkeye bristled at the implication, but the kid either didn’t notice or, more likely, didn’t care. Flash drive destroyed, he pulled off his watch, tossing it onto the table. He then pulled a gun from somewhere, and shot the thing. Six times.

The kid tossed the now empty gun aside and grinned at Hawkeye. “I’m ready now.”

Hawkeye looked at him askance. “Why’d you shoot your watch?”

“Hm?” The kid glanced over at the destroyed watch. “Oh, I never liked it. Shall we go?”

Hawkeye considered pushing the issue, but decided he didn’t want to risk losing the kid’s unexpected cooperation. 

“Yeah, fine. Except you need to give me your knives first.”

“Oh, of course!” The kid produced two knives, presenting them eagerly. Hawkeye took them carefully, looking them over. He frowned.

“These are clean…” he finally said, looking back at the kid. “Unless you managed to clean them completely in the one minute I left you alone, these are different knives.”

The kid didn’t say anything. He just kept grinning that stupid grin. Hawkeye sighed.

“You know what? Whatever. You could probably kill me with your bare hands. Keep your dumb knives, I don’t care. Just know that when you stab me in the back, I will be severely unimpressed.”

The kid laughed, patting Hawkeye on the shoulder. “I like you! Let’s go. I’m sure that your team is waiting for you.”

The kid fairly skipped out of the room, ignoring the bloody footprints he was leaving on the ground. Hawkeye followed, unwilling to let the kid out of his sight. He could only think one thing.

_ Sure hope I know what I’m getting myself in to.  _


	2. Chapter 2

Steve stared steadily at the boy sitting across the table from him. The kid seemed perfectly at ease, even though he was locked up in an interrogation room in Avenger’s Tower. Most people would be at least a little apprehensive in such a situation, but not this kid. He might as well be lounging on a beach for all the discomfort he showed. 

Steve sighed, rubbing his forehead. He looked at the kid tiredly.

“You have to talk sometime.” he said, frustration leaking into his voice. The kid smirked.

“Come on Cap, where’s the can do attitude? I wanna see the Captain who can ‘do this all day.’”

Steve stiffened at that. He looked at the kid closely, frowning. “How did you know about…”

The kid smiled mysteriously, not saying anything. Steve fought back the urge to groan. 

“Okay, look. We can’t go on like this. It’s been hours. What do you need for you to start explaining yourself?”

The kid’s smile dimmed and he tilted his head to the side, considering. Finally he sighed, leaning forward.

“I don’t want to talk to you.”

Steve blinked. For some strange reason, that hurt his feelings. People always wanted to talk to him; he was Captain America. What had he done to make this kid dislike him?

It seemed that the teen saw the hurt in Steve’s expression, because he continued hurriedly.

“I didn’t mean it like that! Honestly, it’s more like, I don’t think you want to talk to me.”

Steve’s brow furrowed. He leaned back, rubbing his chin. “What do you mean by that?”

The kid sighed again, slumping a bit in his seat. “Look, you seem like the type to believe in people. I mean, not totally, that’s obvious, but you still have that spark in you, that urge to believe the best of people. And my story, well it’s not a pretty one. Now I’m not stupid. I know exactly where the cameras are in this room, and I know that every single one of you is hearing what I’m saying. So no matter what, you are going to know what happened to me. But I guess I don’t want to have to actually watch more of the light go out of your eyes. That’s all.” 

Steve frowned. He did not like the sound of that. At least it seemed like the kid was willing to talk, just not to him. 

“Okay. Well, who do you want to talk to then?”

The kid tapped the table, thinking. He suddenly grinned.

“I wanna talk to Barton.” He widened his eyes comically. “Oops! I meant Hawkeye. Cause I definitely don’t know any of your names.”

Steve gave the kid a look, but he let it go. He stood up, walking to the door, waiting for it to unlock. The kid never took his eyes off of him, keeping eye contact until the door closed behind him.

Steve walked to the observation room, meeting up with the rest of the of the team. He raised an eyebrow at Barton. “You willing to talk to him?”

Clint looked at the screen. The kid was staring straight at one of the cameras, so it looked like they were having a staring contest. Finally, Clint looked away.

“Yeah, alright.”

Clint walked out of the room, heading toward the interrogation room. He didn’t hesitate at the door, walking straight in. He took a seat in the chair Steve had been occupying, putting his feet up on the table and crossing his arms. 

The kid looked amused by Clint’s display. He copied his position, crossing his own arms. Clint rolled his eyes, uncrossing his arms. 

“You wanted to talk to me?”

The kid didn’t say anything, eyeing Clint. Clint sighed.

“Fine. I’ll talk then. Why are you here?”

The kid smirked. “Uh… you brought me here. Remember?”

Clint tapped his hand on his knee, nodding. 

“True, but I’ve seen you in action. You could have gotten away if you wanted to. Am I wrong?”

The kid sprawled backwards looking up at the ceiling. He half shrugged. 

“I dunno. Maybe? I’m pretty good, but so are you guys. You might have caught me. But yeah, odds are I could have gotten away.”

“So why are you here?” Clint pressed. “Did your employers tell you to allow yourself to get captured so you could get information on us?”

The kid laughed. “Uh, yeah no. My ‘employers’ would be royally pissed if they knew I was here. Though that does sound like something they would do.”

“Okay, then what is it? Why did you come with us?”

The kid’s ever present smirk faded. For the first time since he met the kid, he seemed uncertain. He shifted in his chair, looking away. Clint waited, sensing that this was not the time to push.

“Natasha Romanov.”

Clint tensed. What did this kid know about Natasha?

“She was an assassin.” the kid said slowly. “For the Russian government. Trained from a young to be the perfect spy. Odds were that she would work for them until she was either killed in the field or outlived her usefulness.”

“What’s your point?” Clint spat. He did not like this deadly kid talking about Natasha.

“My point,” the kid said emphatically. “Is that she beat the odds. She got out. Because of you.”

The tension drained out of Clint as he suddenly understood what this was about. He put his feet on the ground, leaning forward. For the first time he really looked at the kid. Under the smiles and attitude, there was undeniable tension, hurt, and fear. This kid wasn't as unaffected as he pretended to be.

“That’s what this is, isn’t it? You want out.”

“I never wanted in! I said no!” The kid yelled, slamming a hand down on the table. He looked shocked at his own outburst, pulling his hand in and cradling it against his chest.

“I said no,” he whispered, as if to assure himself.

Looking at the kid now, there was no trace of the cocky, confident teen from before. With his walls momentarily down, Clint could almost see the years of abuse rolling off of the kid.

Then the moment was over. The walls came slamming back up, and the cheerful teen was back.

“Sorry about that.” the kid said with a smile. “Not sure where that came from.”

Clint looked him over. The kid was good, but he was shaken. There were cracks in his mask, his act not as convincing as it had been a minute ago. 

Clint signed. “Look kid, I want to help you, but I need more information. Who are you running from?”

The kid's smile vanished, and he looked at Clint uncertainly. Clint waited a few moments before sighing.

“I'm going to go grab you some food, alright? And maybe some water, so you can clean yourself up. In the meantime, you decide what you want to say to me.”

When the kid didn't react, Clint stood up. He was almost at the door when the kid spoke.

“Wait!”

Clint turned around, waiting. The kid hesitated a moment longer before the words came rushing out.

“You work for SHIELD, right?”

Clint raised an eyebrow, but he nodded. The kid chewed on his lip for a second, before taking the final plunge.

“Tell Fury that you have Alex Rider locked up in Avenger's Tower. He'll tell you everything you need to know.”

Clint nodded and left the room. He walked back to the observation room, immediately honing in on Natasha. 

“What do you think?” He asked the Russian. He was pretty sure that the kid was being sincere, but he wanted a second opinion. The kid was an excellent actor, but if anyone could see through his lies, it would be Natasha.

Natasha watched the kid through the screen. He had placed his head on the table, covering it with his arms. She turned to Clint.

“I think he's telling the truth.” She said simply.

Clint nodded, looking at Steve. Steve run a hand through his hair before letting his arms drop.

“Alright.” Steve said. “Let's call Fury then.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“What do you want Stark?”

The team was in the main living room. Clint had brought the kid, Alex, food and water, but the kid had ignored them. He hadn't reacted to anything Clint had done, keeping his head buried in his arms. Clint had finally given up, joining the rest of the team to call Fury. Unfortunately, hours had passed since they'd brought the kid in, and it was now very late. Fury was not impressed with them calling him in the middle of the night.

“Chill, Fury. You're about to be really happy that I called.”

“I sincerely doubt that,” Fury muttered, but he gestured for Stark to continue.

“You see,” Tony began. “We ran into a little problem on our mission. That problem is fourteen years old, better at killing people than Barton, and is currently sitting in our interrogation room.”

Fury froze. He glared at Tony.

“Are you screwing with me, Stark?”

Tony shook his head, not intimidated by Fury's glare in the least.

“Apparently his name is Alex Rider.” Steve interjected, wanting to avoid a fight. “Does that name mean anything to you sir?”

Fury leaned back in his chair.

“Well I'll be damned. Yes that name means something to me Captain.”

“Who is he?” Banner asked, shifting uneasily. “There's something about him that just seems… wrong.”

“That's not surprising.” Fury said dryly. He took in the Avengers’ expectant faces and sighed.

“Simply put, Alex Rider is the world’s youngest intelligence agent.”

The team was silent for a moment before they burst into sound, all yelling at once.

“One at a time!” Fury yelled, shutting most of them down.

“Sir, that has got to be illegal.” Steve said, righteous anger pouring off of him.

“It is.” Fury shrugged. “Doesn't make him any less effective an agent.”

“Maybe you should start from the top.” Natasha suggested, as level headed as always. Only Clint could see the tension in her shoulders, the anger in the way she held herself.

“Good idea, Romanov. Though it’s a longer story than you may be expecting.”

The Avenger’s all found a seat in the room, staring at Fury.

The man rolled his eye, but he obliged.

“It all started with Alex’s dad, John Rider.”

Both Clint and Natasha stiffened. 

“John Rider? As in,  _ the  _ John Rider?” Clint asked cautiously.

“Yes, Barton.  _ The  _ John Rider.” Fury said, sounding slightly exasperated.

“Wait, who is John Rider?” Steve asked, looking at Clint and Natasha. 

“He’s a legend in the spy world.” Natasha said, a bit of awe tinging her voice. “He was the only person to ever successfully infiltrate the terrorist group Scorpia and get out alive.”

“He sounds like a worthy warrior.” Thor said with a smile. “I would like to meet this John Rider.”

“Yeah, well, you might not want to set your heart on that happening. He didn’t live long after that.” Fury said darkly. “John Rider and his wife died in a plane crash shortly after he pulled out of Scorpia. Alex became orphan before he was even a year old.” 

Fury rubbed his forehead, looking tired. “Unfortunately, Alex’s life only got worse from there.”

“How could it get worse?” Steve asked. Tony looked at him askance. 

“You clearly had a good home life if you need to ask that.” he muttered.

“As much as I hate to say it, Stark is right.” Fury said with a grimace. “Alex was left in the care of his uncle, Ian Rider. Ian was also a spy, so Alex’s home life was already bound to be… unstable, but by all accounts, Ian Rider was a hard man to live with.”

The whole team glanced at each other, uneasy. Bruce cleared his throat. “When you say hard…”

“He was most likely abusive.” Fury said bluntly. “Multiple teachers sighted concerns about strange injuries that Alex had, and some of his behaviors suggested that things were not quite right in the Rider household. Nothing ever came from any of the accusations, until Alex was nine years old.”

“What happened?” Clint asked. He knew that it had to be something really bad for a valuable agent to get in trouble for it.

“Alex came to school sick one day. Not the sniffles, mind you, but full on vomit, cough your lungs up, sick. The school tried to call Ian to come pick Alex up, but the man never responded. It finally came out that Ian had left Alex alone in the house for more than a week.

“Ian tried to defend himself, claiming he had found a sitter and that it wasn’t his fault that the man never showed, but it wasn’t very effective. The court ruled that Ian needed to get a permanent caretaker for Alex, or they would take him away.”

Fury paused, taking a deep breath, before continuing. “That was when Jack Starbright entered the picture.”

“Jack was Alex’s caretaker?” Steve asked, and Fury nodded.

“She was an American student, and she was hired on as a housekeeper and babysitter. After Jack entered the household, things seemed to get better. Reports from teachers dropped off, and Alex was reported to be a lot happier.”

“That’s the thing.” Tony interrupted. “I know the kid’s family were all spies, and yeah his uncle was a waste of human space, but that doesn’t explain how he ended up in a Hydra base slaughtering guards. How did that happen?”

“His uncle died.”

Tony blinked. “Okay… help me out here. How did his uncle dying turn Alex into a mini Barton/Romanov?”

Clint and Natasha both glared at Tony, but the billionaire ignored them. 

“It wasn’t Ian’s death that made Alex what he is, it was his life.”

Clint and Natasha stopped glaring at Tony to look at Fury curiously.

“Explain.” Natasha said shortly. She had a bad feeling that Alex’s story was about to become way too similar to her own. 

“Ian wasn’t your typical abusive guardian.” Fury explained. “He was training Alex his entire life to be a spy. By the time Alex was eleven, he spoke six languages, was a black belt in multiple fighting styles, knew how to mountain climb, ski, scuba dive, you name it, the kid could do it. He had all the skills that intelligence agencies want in prospective agents.”

“And then his uncle died, leaving him without a guardian.” Clint said, feeling slightly sick. Things were starting to make a terrible kind of sense. 

“That’s where you’re wrong.” Fury corrected. “Alex had a guardian, but it wasn’t someone who had his best interests at heart.”

“Who?” Tony was getting sick of Fury’s stalling. 

Fury sighed. “MI6 became Alex’s legal guardian.”

“Okay, hold on.” Steve exploded. “I can accept everything before this, but I draw the line here. There is no way that that is legal.”

“Anything’s legal when you’re the one making the laws.” Fury said wryly. “Ian left Alex in MI6’s care, and that was that. The only person who could challenge them for guardianship was Jack, and she was in Britain with a visa. A visa which conveniently expired right around the time Ian died.”

“Of course it did.” Tony muttered darkly. “Let me guess, they said that she could stay if Alex agreed to be their little spy.”

“Got it in one, Stark.” Fury confirmed. “It’s all speculation on our part, but shortly after Alex agreed to ‘work’ for MI6, Starbright’s visa was renewed.”

“And Alex has worked for them ever since.” Natasha concluded. She was working hard to contain her anger, but it was obvious that she was furious. Most of the team made a mental note to stay out of her way for the next few days.

Fury nodded. “It’s hard to get information on Alex’s life once he entered MI6, but yes. Of course, Alex doesn’t just work for MI6. They lend him out like he’s a freaking toy. Almost every intelligence agency in the world has used him at some point or another.” 

Fury snorted in disgust. “Even Byrne has used him. That’s actually how I first learned about Alex. Byrne was telling me that I should request him from MI6 for an assignment I was working on.”

“What did you tell him sir?” Natasha asked stiffly.

“I told him that I didn’t need to abuse children to do my job.” Fury spat. “I swear, the way the man talked about Alex. As if he was a library book you could check out and return, free of charge, as long as you didn’t damage him too badly. I never had much respect for Byrne, but that was the day he lost what little he had.”

“So to summarize.” Tony said faux cheerfully. “This kid was abused by his uncle, abused by his government, abused by  _ foreign _ governments, and has decided that he doesn’t want to be abused anymore. I can get behind that.”

“Wait, what about his housekeeper, Jack?” Bruce interjected. “From what you said, he had a good relationship with her. Would he be willing to just leave her behind?”

Fury didn’t say anything for a moment. He almost looked… sad. 

“Jack Starbright is dead.” he said finally. “She was killed by Scorpia.”

The whole team fell silent at that. For some reason, they hadn’t been expecting that.

“But, who does he live with then?” Steve asked cautiously.

“After Starbright’s death, he moved in with an American family, the Pleasures. He lived with them for about two months before their house burned down. The entire family was killed.”

Tony groaned. “Something tells me that wasn’t an accident.”

“It wasn’t,” Fury said grimmly. “Alex was found three months later. He had been spending some… quality time with some terrorists he’d managed to piss off.”

“Torture.” Clint said. It wasn’t a question.

Fury nodded anyway. “After that, Alex dropped completely off the grid. We know that he has been completing missions, but we haven’t been able to figure out where he’s been staying between them. Our best guess is that MI6 locks him up in some safehouse with some sort of minder, or more likely, trainer. His skills have skyrocketed since the Pleasure’s deaths. We have no clue what they are doing to the kid, but whatever it is, it’s working. 

“If by working, you mean completely destroying the kid, then yeah sure. I guess.” Clint said sarcastically. Fury gave him a look, but didn’t deny it. 

“Okay. So, clearly the situation is bad. The question is, what do we do now?” Steve asked, sounding more like he was talking to himself than to the other Avengers.

“We must help him!” Thor boomed. “He is clearly a warrior of great strength, and he deserves our assistance.”

“Trust me big guy, no one here is saying we shouldn’t help the kid.” Tony assured. “We just need to be careful about how we do it. No need to start an international incident.”

“Well, you better come up with a plan quick.” Bruce put in anxiously. “The Other Guy is really mad about the situation. If you don’t come up with something soon, he may decide the best course of action will be for him to smash the people who did this to Alex. And seeing how they are on the other side of the ocean, I can’t see that going well.”

“Well, we have one thing working in our favor.” Natasha said. When everyone looked at her questioningly, she huffed. 

“What they are doing is beyond illegal.” She growled. “Can you imagine the outrage if the public found out about this? Multiple careers would be over, if they were lucky enough to stay out of prison.”

“Are you suggesting we blackmail the British government?” Tony asked, raising an eyebrow.

Natasha raised her eyebrow right back. “I’m not  _ not  _ suggesting it.”

“That may not be necessary.” Fury interjected. “We have another card we can play.”

“What would you suggest?” Steve asked.

Fury smirked. “Alex is a foreign agent found on American soil without permission. He also killed a significant number of American citizens. Legally, we can hold him as long as we like.”

“Long enough to find a more long term solution.” Clint said slowly. He grinned. “That’s brilliant.”

“I’m not the director of SHIELD for nothing,” Fury said wryly. “For now, keep Alex under the radar. The longer we can hold him without anyone knowing, the better. I’ve been working on the Rider problem since I first learned about Alex, but we may have an actual chance at getting him out now.”

“Roger that sir.” Steve said, saluting. Fury rolled his eye.

“Thank you Captain. Now go to sleep, all of you. It’s too late for any of this.” And with that, he hung up.

The team stared at each other in silence. All of them were determined to help the damaged boy in their interrogation room to the best of their abilities. 

Suddenly, Tony started to laugh. The rest of the team stared at him as if he was crazy. 

“What?” Clint asked.

“Sorry,” Tony said, wiping away tears of mirth. “It’s just, it just occurred to me that we are going to try and raise an emotionally unstable kid who is also a super assassin. I mean, I doubt any of us are fit to try and raise a normal child, let alone one like Alex Rider. Come on, what on earth made any of us think that this would be a good idea?”

The rest of the team stared at each other in horror. This was going to be bad. 


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This gets... dark. Just a heads up.

Clint sighed, dropping onto the couch. He was bored. Natasha was on a solo mission, and everyone else was busy doing ‘important things.’ Grumbling to himself, Clint picked up his quiver and began to look over his arrows. He knew that they were fine, but it was something to do. Besides, one could never be too careful with essential equipment.

“Whatcha doing?”

Clint swore, spinning around to see Alex leaning on the back of the couch. “Geez kid, you’re going to give me a heart attack one of these days.”

Alex leaned his face on one hand and blinked innocently at Clint.

“You didn’t answer my question.”

Clint sighed. “I’m just looking over my arrows, making sure they’re in good condition. Which I’m sure you already knew.” he added with a pointed glare.

Alex ignored the look, jumping over the back of the couch to land next to Clint. 

“Sounds like a great idea.” He said with a smile. “I think I’ll join you.” And with that, he pulled a knife out and began sharpening it.

Clint rolled his eyes. “You and your knives,” he muttered, but he let it go. At first, the team had tried to take Alex’s knives away, but he always seemed to have more. They had no clue where the kid was getting them, but they had finally realized that it was pointless to try and limit his access to the deadly blades. 

Alex smirked, not looking up from his knife. Clint rolled his eyes again, and went back to looking over his arrows.

Having Alex in the Tower was strange, and yet not as strange as one would think. The kid had been living in the Tower for a month, and he was surprisingly unobtrusive. Part of it was the fact that the kid was a freaking ninja and had a tendency to completely disappear for hours on end. The first time it had happened, they had panicked. Jarvis had assured them that Alex hadn’t left the Tower, but the AI had been unable to locate him. They had been about to call Fury, when Alex wandered into the living room, asking them what was wrong. 

They had yelled at Alex for hours, but the kid had refused to say where he had been. By his attitude, he hadn’t seemed to see what the big deal was.

They’d finally stopped yelling at him, sure that he had learned his lesson. But less than a week later, he’d done it again. 

Like so many things when it came to Alex, they had finally given up trying to get him to stop. He always turned up again without fail, and he seemed annoyed by their worry. The end result was that sometimes, they forgot that Alex was even in the Tower. He moved silently, so you wouldn’t know he was there unless he chose to announce himself. Clint could go days without seeing the teen spy, which was what made his sudden appearances all the more startling.

Done looking over his arrows, Clint looked at Alex. The kid seemed perfectly at ease working with his knife. He actually looked happier than Clint had seen him in a while. 

“Okay, real talk. What is it with you and the knives?” he asked.

Alex looked up at him, his usual smirk firmly in place. 

“What is it with you and the arrows?” he shot back.

“You didn’t answer my question.” Clint mocked, imitating Alex’s voice from earlier. 

Alex laughed, putting his knife down. “Yeah, I guess I walked into that one.”

“So?” Clint asked, setting his quiver on the floor. 

Alex hesitated, thinking. 

“I dunno. I just don’t like guns that much.”

Clint raised an eyebrow. “You are remarkably proficient with them for disliking them.”

Alex snorted. “I’m not about to neglect a life saving skill just cause I’m not fond of guns.”

“That still doesn’t answer my question.” Clint pressed. “Why knives?”

Alex got a faraway look on his face.

“They feel more honest.” he finally said. “If I’m going to kill someone, I want to be there. I need to feel their life draining out with their blood, I need to be able to look into their eyes as they die. That way, I can’t shirk responsibility. I have to acknowledge what I’ve done. It’s too easy to disassociate when you kill from a distance. There’s no dehumanizing someone when they’re choking on their own blood in front of you.”

“You do know that you’re talking to a sniper.” Clint said dryly.

Alex shot him an amused look. “And you’re talking to someone who’s been sniped. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not some honorable warrior. I’ve killed people in about every way possible, including sniping from a distance. I’ll play dirty if it means staying alive. But if I have a choice, I’ll go with my knives. I know it sounds weird, but I feel like killing people up close and personal is one of the only things that has kept me from becoming a complete monster.”

Clint thought it over. In a way, it made sense. One of the first things an assassin was taught was how to dehumanize targets. It made it so that when the time came, you wouldn’t hesitate to take the shot. Killing someone with a knife was the complete opposite of sniping them. You couldn’t get much more personal without using your bare hands.

Clint looked at Alex in a new light. He wasn’t sure if he was impressed that Alex had managed to hang on to his belief in the sanctity of human life, or disturbed that he could still kill so effortlessly while maintaining that belief. 

Clint shook his head. 

“I swear, the more I learn about you, the more confused I get. An assassin that actively tries to see his targets as individual people? Unheard of.”

Alex laughed, stretching out on the couch.

“I know.” The kid chuckled. “Drove my teacher insane. He was always trying to beat my empathy out of me, but it never worked. Honestly, I think I held onto it almost as a ‘screw you’ to him, and the whole of bloody MI6. They can all go stick it. I refuse to become their perfect little weapon.”

Clint fell silent at that. He knew that Alex’s life had been hard. You only had to spend ten minutes with the kid to get that. But the idea of someone actively trying to beat the empathy out of a child was just disgusting. He didn’t care what people may say, sometimes the ends did not justify the means.

“When you say ‘teacher’ you mean…” Clint probed gently. He would really like to meet this mysterious ‘teacher.’ Any person who would see empathy in a teenager as a bad thing was someone who really deserved to be on the pointy end of one of his arrows. Maybe even the explosive end. 

Alex tensed, his smile vanishing. “Nothing. I didn’t say anything.”

Alex jumped off the couch, practically running from the room. Clint watched him go, not bothering to try and stop him. He had heard enough for one day.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Clint didn’t see Alex again for almost a week. He was pretty sure that the kid was avoiding him. Clint didn’t mind. He knew that other team members had seen him around, and as long as the kid was safe, he could do what he wanted. 

The next time he saw Alex was right after Natasha got back from her solo mission. The two spies were in the kitchen, enjoying some quality time together, when Alex dropped out of the ceiling onto the kitchen counter.

The reaction was instantaneous. Natasha pulled out two hand guns, aiming them at Alex, while Clint grabbed a knife and threw it in his direction.

Alex caught the knife an inch in front of his face. He looked at it speculatively, before deeming it worthy.

“Thanks.” He said cheerfully, slipping the knife into his pocket. He settled more comfortably on the counter, crossing his legs.

Natasha put away her guns, crossing her arms.

“Alex.” She said sternly, ignoring Clint’s swearing. “What were you doing in the ceiling?”

“Exploring.” Alex said innocently. 

“Uh huh.” Natasha said, unimpressed. “Learn anything interesting while you were exploring?”

Alex brightened. “When Tony and Pepper are alone, they like to-”

“Okay! I’m gonna stop you right there!” Clint interrupted. “I have no desire to know what Tony and Pepper get up to on their own.”

“Spoilsport.” Alex pouted. Natasha laughed, filling up a teapot with water and setting it on the stove. 

Alex watched her carefully, presumably looking for injuries. “It’s good to see you back in one piece Tasha. Go anywhere interesting?”

“You know I can’t tell you that Alex.” Natasha said indulgently. 

Alex was the only person besides Clint who was able to call Natasha anything but her full name without serious risk of maiming. She had a soft spot for the teen, not surprising considering their similar upbringings. Maybe that was the reason Natasha was the only person who was able to exert any type of control over the teen spy. 

“You know Alex,” Natasha said, turning back to the boy. “You may want to be careful about what you say concerning Tony. Jarvis might sell you out.”

“He wouldn’t. We Brits stick together.” Alex said cheerfully. He glanced up at the ceiling. “Right Jarvis?”

“Indeed, good sir.” Jarvis’s voice said. “Alex and I have an… agreement.”

“An agreement?” Clint said incredulously. “What on earth do you have to offer an AI? Is this why we can never find you when you go AWOL?”

“That’s for me to know, and you to stay up nights crying because you don’t.” Alex said with a grin, jumping off the counter. He grabbed the whistling tea pot off the stove, setting it on the counter where he had been sitting. 

It happened as Alex was reaching into the cupboard to grab some tea bags. Alex always wore long sleeves, not surprising considering his profession. But as he reached up to the top shelf, his sleeve slipped down a little. 

Natasha’s hand shot out, grabbing Alex’s wrist. Alex froze, every muscle in his body tensing. Clint could almost see him fighting the urge to just judo flip Nat right then and there.

Instead of fighting, Alex stood perfectly still as Natasha rolled up his sleeves. Clint sucked in a sharp breath when he saw the line of straight scars covering his wrists and forearms. 

There was dead silence in the kitchen, no one moving. Finally, Alex spoke.

“It’s not what you think.”

“Then explain.” Natasha said shortly.

Alex took a deep breath. 

“There was this man.” he said hesitantly. “By the name of Phillip Thompson. He was an arms dealer for multiple large terrorist organizations. I was sent in to investigate him. But I got caught.”

Alex paused, collecting his thoughts. 

“Phillip had a brother. They were really close, but also really competitive, especially when it came to basketball for some reason. After they caught me, they decided they should celebrate with a good old game of one on one. I was the scorekeeper. Each of them chose one of my arms, and whenever they scored they’d, well, make note of it on their assigned arm. The game was supposed to end once I bled out.”

“Who won?” Natasha asked, not letting go of Alex’s arm.

Alex smiled. It wasn’t a happy expression. “I did.”

Natasha nodded, finally releasing Alex’s arm. He rolled his sleeves back down, hiding the scars once again. 

“Are you ashamed?” Clint asked.

Alex looked at him questioningly.

“Of your scars.” Clint clarified. 

“No.” There was no hesitation in Alex’s voice when he responded. “I just don’t like the way people look at me when they see them. They assume that they know me, but really, they don’t understand anything.”

Alex fingered his arm for moment, before stopping abruptly.

“I’m going to explore some more.” he said, jumping onto the kitchen counter and swinging up into the ceiling. Within seconds, Natasha and Clint were alone again.

Natasha sighed. “Well, that was terrible. If I wasn’t sure that those men were already dead, I would kill them myself.”

Clint nodded, absently making two cups of tea. 

“Did you know that he’s been sniped?” he asked conversationally. “Oh, and his ‘teacher’ used to try to beat the empathy out of him.”

Natasha shook her head. “You know, I’m pretty sure you could me just about anything about that kid, and none of it would surprise me. How is Fury doing on getting him out of MI6?”

“Not too good.” Clint admitted, handing Natasha her tea. “Fun fact: Alex is considered a terrorist by the UN.”

“What?” Natasha yelled, standing up so quickly that her cup of tea tipped over.

“Yeah.” Clint said tiredly. “He technically joined Scorpia for like, three weeks back when he was eleven, so MI6 registered him as a terrorist. Of course, it was just a means to control him further. Any intelligence agency that comes across him is legally required to hand him back over to MI6, unless he is out with their permission of course. MI6 aren’t taking care of Alex like a guardian, they are literally treating him like a prisoner. Unless we get Alex’s name off the terrorist watch list, there isn’t much we can do to get him out of MI6 custody.”

“That is absolutely ridiculous.” Natasha raged. “There isn’t a single intelligence agency in the world that honestly thinks that Alex is a terrorist.”

“Well, yeah.” Clint muttered. “Of course they know Alex isn’t a terrorist. But none of them are going to stand up for him. If MI6 loses control of Alex, they all lose access to an incredibly effective tool. Even if SHIELD was to go before the UN with proof that Alex was an upstanding citizen, at least three other agencies would be there with evidence to prove that he should be classified a war criminal. We can’t win.”

Natasha sat back down in her chair, running a hand through her hair. She swore violently and creatively in Russian for nearly a solid minute. Clint let her. Natasha didn’t lose control of her emotions very often, so when she did, it was best to just let them run their course.

When Natasha finally calmed down, she looked at Clint.

“I’m sorry.” She said quietly. “It’s just, seeing those scars really made it hit home for me. Alex is a just a kid, and they have put him in the field to be tortured. My childhood may have been terrible, but at least they waited until I was an adult before they sent me out to the wolves. What the hell are they thinking?”

“I dunno Nat.” Clint said with a shrug. “You and I have dedicated our lives to fighting evil people. Have you ever really understood any of them?”

Clint stood up, his cup of tea untouched. “Come on. You look like you could use a good sparring session.”

Natasha managed a smile at that, and the two left the kitchen. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Alex stayed perfectly still where he was sitting, listening to Natasha and Clint leave the kitchen. When he was sure they were gone, he dropped back onto the counter.

He wandered over to Clint’s tea, picking it up and sipping it. Contrary to what Natasha and Clint thought, he hadn’t left the room after fleeing into the ceiling. He’d stayed put, curious to see what the two spies would say. He hadn’t liked it.

Alex sighed, dumping the rest of the tea into the sink. He hadn’t known that he was classified as a terrorist. Of everything MI6 had done to him, that one almost hurt the most. He had given up so much for the world, sacrificed  _ so much _ , and that was his reward? To be considered a criminal, the worst of the worst?

Alex laughed bitterly. Well, they weren’t that far off. He had killed quite a few people, in some pretty imaginative ways. His mind flashed to Phillip Thompson and his brother. He had strung them upside down by their ankles and then sat. And just waited. It had taken longer than he thought it would for them to die. The brother had gone first after about fourteen hours. Phillip had screamed nonstop for an hour after his brother died. He only stopped when he started choking. It had taken an additional forty five minutes before Phillip followed his brother into death.

Alex wasn’t even sure why he had done it. The brothers hadn’t even done anything particularly bad to him. At least, not by his standards. But when he had them at his mercy, he didn’t kill them quickly like he usually did. Maybe it was because he hadn’t been working under a time limit at the time. There had been no world to save, just two people who had hurt him. And Alex was so tired of being hurt. 

Alex suddenly felt nauseous. He lunged to the sink, barely making it before he threw up. It wasn’t long before he was dry heaving. Alex didn’t eat much, so it didn’t take much to empty his stomach. 

Finally regaining control of his body, Alex turned the sink on, washing out his mouth. He was shocked to realize that he was crying. Since when did he cry? Alex wiped at the tears angrily. There was no reason for him to be so upset. He had made peace with the Thompsons' deaths a long time ago. Why was he suddenly so upset?

He knew why. It was because of the Avengers. He was afraid that if they knew what he had done, if they knew what he really was, they would throw him out. Why would anyone want someone like him around? He was a monster.

Natasha’s words echoed in his mind.  _ “Alex is just a kid.” _

_ “No.”  _ H e thought hopelessly.  _ “I’m not. And I haven’t been for a long, long time.” _


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so mean...

“Excuse me sir, but Mr. Stark requests your presence in the living room.”

“Oh really?” Clint said, shooting another arrow down the firing range. “Well you can tell Stark to shove it.”

“He is most insistent, sir.” Jarvis persisted. “He claims that you will want to see this.”

Clint rolled his eyes, but he finally acquiesced. He put his bow away and dutifully wandered into the living room. Tony looked extremely excited, more so than usual. Clint sat down on the couch as the rest of the team filtered into the room. Alex was a no show, but that wasn’t very surprising. Alex didn’t like crowds, and he seemed uneasy around most of the Avengers. Clint and Natasha were the only ones he was seemed even mildly comfortable around. They saw him more often than all the other Avengers combined. 

“What’s got you so excited?” Bruce asked. “Nothing in the lab is at a point that would make you this happy.”

“Have you finally figured out how to make out with your one true love, yourself?” Clint asked, still annoyed at being forced to abandon his practice.

“Very funny birdbrain. No, I’ve accomplished something a great deal better!”

“Well?” Steve asked, looking a little aggravated by Tony's grandstanding. 

Tony smirked, pressing a few keys on a panel in front of him. “I present to you… Alex’s file from MI6!”

With a grand sweeping gesture, Tony turned on a screen. It was a bit anticlimactic, since it was just a series of heavily redacted files, but the team was still impressed. 

“How did you manage it?” Natasha asked, leaning forward to get a closer look at the information. “SHIELD has been trying for a year, and they haven’t got anywhere.”   
  


Tony snorted. “Please. If I can hack SHIELD, why wouldn’t I be able to hack something that they couldn’t? Oh, and Banner.”

Bruce looked up at Tony, a questioning look on his face.

Tony tossed him an ipad. “I downloaded Alex’s medical file onto that. I figured you’d be the best one to look at it.”

Bruce caught the ipad, and began to look through it.

“So, have you read the whole thing?” Clint asked. He couldn’t imagine Tony waiting for the rest of the team to read the thing.

“A lot of it.” Tony admitted. “It’s pretty terrible. Most information is redacted, but what you can see is… chilling. I swear, this kid is scarier than Romanov.”

Natasha scowled, glaring at Tony.

Tony swallowed, suddenly a shade paler. “Uh… right. Moving on. Bruce, anything pop out at you?”

Bruce shook his head slowly, still flicking through files. “It’s ridiculous. From what I can tell, Alex has been injured in almost every way possible, but I can’t be sure. Any helpful information has been pulled. This would be next to useless for any doctor. How is this kid even alive?” 

“I think we all wonder that.” Steve said darkly. The whole team fell silent for a minute before Tony cleared his throat. 

“I may have the answer to that.” he said carefully. Suddenly, every Avenger was staring at him.

“What do you mean?” Bruce asked, setting the ipad aside.

“I found a series of videos labeled training.” Tony explained. “It seems straightforward enough, but there’s something… weird about them.”

“Spit it out Stark.” Natasha growled.

“I’m trying.” he muttered. “The thing is, these videos were hidden in the files, quite skillfully. It wasn’t even me that spotted them, it was Jarvis. It’s almost as if whoever put those videos in there was trying to hide them from the people who could access the file.”

“Why would they do that?” Steve asked, genuinely confused. 

Tony shrugged. “Maybe if we watch them, it will make more sense. I thought it would be best to view them as a team.”

“So we get to see what made the young Rider into such a fierce warrior.” Thor said with a smile. “It should be most interesting.”

No one else on the team looked very excited. The exchanged uneasy looks, before settling down more comfortably. 

“Jarvis, play the first video.” Tony called, perching on the edge of the couch.

The screen turned black for a second, before showing a room. It was a gym, filled with various typical equipment. In the center of the room was a sparring mat. Standing on the mat were two people.

One was clearly Alex, a few years younger, but unmistakable. He didn’t look good. He was incredibly pale, and his face was blank, empty. Clint frowned. He recognized that look. He had seen it on agents who had been rescued from behind enemy lines, agents who had been missing for months. Clint felt sick as he realized that this video must have been taken soon after Alex was rescued after the Pleasures’ deaths. Clearly, MI6 had not given him the time to get over their deaths and his own subsequent torture before they decided to start training him further.

The other man stood with his back to the camera, so Clint couldn't see his face, but there was something about him that was familiar. Clint could only assume that this was the ‘teacher’ that Alex had mentioned. Clint was eager to get a good look at the man.

Alex and the man were circling each other, looking for openings. As the man slowly turned around, Clint was shocked to realize he knew exactly who he was.

He wasn’t the only one. Natasha tensed, sitting up straight. “Jarvis, pause the video.” She said, staring at the screen with intense focus.

“Who is he?” Steve asked. He could tell that both Clint and Natasha recognized the man, and based on the looks on their faces, he was bad news. 

“Yassen Gregorovich.” Natasha spat. “The world’s greatest assassin.”

“Wait, I thought you two were the world’s greatest assassins.” Tony said, looking at the two spies.

Clint snorted. “We’re up there, don’t get me wrong. In the right circumstances, I’d even say we were better, especially if we’re working as a team. But Gregorovich… he’s a legend.”

“A dead legend.” Natasha growled. “That’s what everyone said. Gregorovitch was killed three years ago. Before this video was taken.”

Tony groaned. “No one ever dies in your profession, do they?”

“Actually,” Clint said sharply. “Quite a few do.”

Tony looked ashamed as he thought about what he’d said. He looked away, fiddling with a few pieces of wire. Steve looked between the two, before intervening.

“Well, it looks like people were mistaken. Gregorovitch is clearly alive. And... training Alex? But, why would MI6 want a known assassin to train Alex? Why would they trust him?”

“It’s more common than you would think for guns for hire to switch sides, especially if the alternative is death.” Clint pointed out. He thought for a second, before adding, “I mean, Nat and I are evidence of that.” 

“Gregorovitch is the best.” Natasha said flatly. “It doesn’t matter how they got him on their side, if he’s the one who’s been training Alex these past two years, than the kid is more dangerous than we thought.”

There was silence in the wake of Natasha’s words.

“Let’s just… keep watching.” Tony said finally. Jarvis acted without prompting, starting the video.

Almost immediately, Alex and Yassen began to fight. It was brutal. It almost looked like they were trying to kill each other. Clint suddenly understood why Alex was such a good fighter. If he had learned to fight like this, than normal people would stand no chance against him. They must look like they were moving in slow motion to Alex.

Despite Alex’s skills, Yassen was better. After a short fight, Alex hit the ground, hard. Most of the team winced at the impact. Yassen took a step back, watching Alex with a neutral expression.

“Again.” The assassin said. Alex dragged himself off the ground and took up a fighting stance. He was even paler, and his hands were visibly shaking. Clint was once again reminded that Alex couldn’t have been out of the hospital for very long before this video was taken. There was no way that he was recovered enough to do a normal training session, let alone one as intense as this.

Yassen didn’t seem to care about Alex’s precarious health. He attacked again. This fight was even shorter. Alex did his best, but he was clearly outmatched. Yassen managed to grab a hold of his arm and twist it up his back, immobilizing Alex. 

“I could break your arm.” Yassen whispered. “I should do it. I should snap your arm like a twig and make you fight with a broken arm. You know better. I’ve taught you how to avoid this hold. I’ve even taught you how to break it, yet here you are.”

Alex struggled in the hold, breathing heavily. Despite his best efforts, he could not escape Yassen’s grasp. Yassen yanked the arm up a little higher, causing Alex to cry out, before shoving the boy away. 

Alex stumbled, but he managed to keep his feet. He quickly spun, keeping Yassen in his sight. Clint noticed him rubbing his arm, and knew that it must hurt. 

“Again.” Yassen said, and every person in the room could hear the threat in his voice. Alex took a deep breath, preparing himself.

The last fight was the worst. Neither Alex nor Yassen were holding back. Clint found himself tensing, recognizing blows that would kill if they landed. Alex managed for a surprisingly long time, longer than the first two fights. He was mostly on the defensive, avoiding blows, but that was his best bet in his current state. 

All it took was one mistake, and Alex was down. He hit the ground with an audible thud. Hs gaping mouth told Clint that the breath had been knocked out of him. After a few moments, he took a sudden breath, coughing as he was finally able to breath again.

“Again.” The Avengers looked at each other in shock. Surely Yassen could not mean that. It was clear to anyone with eyes that Alex could not take another round like that. It would be surprising if he could even stand up.

Alex didn’t move, lying limp on the ground. Yassen’s face turned dark.

“Get up.” He spat. When Alex still didn’t move, the man snarled. 

“Alex Rider, you get up this instant.”

For an agonizing moment, Alex still didn’t move. Then slowly, he began to push himself up. 

He managed to make it to his hands and knees before his shaking arms gave out, and he collapsed back to the ground.

“Alex.” The warning in Yassen’s voice was audible. Alex whimpered, but he tried again. He didn’t make it more than an inch off the ground before he fell again.

Yassen growled, walking up to Alex and grabbing his hair.

“Do you think this is a game?” he asked, yanking the boy’s head off the ground. “Do you think that people will go easy on you because you are a child? Because they won’t. They. Will.  _ Kill you. _

Alex’s face was twisted in pain, his eyes clenched shut. Despite the boy’s efforts, a few tears slipped out and ran down his sweaty cheek.

“And that’s just if you're lucky.” Yassen continued, ignoring Alex’s distress. “If you’re unlucky, they will do things that will make you wish you were dead. Though you already know that, don’t you Alex? I’ve heard you screaming at night. Do you want to end up like that again? A toy for someone else’s sadistic pleasure? Helpless and hurt, begging for someone, anyone to help you, only to know that you are alone. Is that what you want?”

“NO!” Alex screamed, tears streaming down his face in earnest now.

“Then get up!” Yassen yelled, shaking Alex’s head.

“I can’t!” Alex wailed. Yassen dropped his head, and Alex curled up in a ball, sobbing. Yassen looked at him in disgust.

“Pathetic.” He turned and walked out of the room, leaving Alex distraught on the floor. The video ended.

The whole team stared at the blank screen in shock. That was… terrible. How could anyone do that to a child, especially a grieving child who had already lost everything.

“How many videos are there?” Steve asked hoarsely. 

“Uh… four. That was the first one.” Tony answered shakily. He was suddenly very glad that he had not watched the videos alone.

“Okay.” Steve hesitated. He was pretty sure that none of them wanted to watch any of the other videos, but he was also sure that they all wanted to be able to understand Alex better, and this could be the only way to do it. Heavens knew Alex wasn’t going to tell them.

“Jarvis, play the second video.” Steve said with only the barest waver in his voice.

The screen lit up, showing a different room. This one looked more like a classroom, with a desk and chair in the center. Alex was seated at the desk, eyes down with one hand extended in front of him. Some time had clearly passed since the first video. Alex was still too pale, his face too blank, but some of the hopelessness had faded. Yassen walked around him, holding a thin cane that he tapped in one hand, making a rhythmic slapping noise. 

“Paralysis, leading to the shut down of the respiratory system.” Yassen said, almost conversationally.

“Hemlock.” Alex said quietly, not moving an inch except to speak. 

“Arrhythmic heart function leading to suffocation.”

“Aconite.” Alex said without missing a beat. This continued for a few more cycles, Alex naming each poison quickly and correctly.

“Man made, with symptoms not appearing until months later.” Yassen said, sounding bored. 

For the first time since the video began, Alex hesitated. He sucked in a quick breath, his eyes going wide. He recovered quickly, spitting out “ Dimethylmercury” hurriedly.

Yassen stopped moving. Alex seemed frozen, hunched in on himself. Yassen began walking again, and Alex relaxed.

Suddenly, the cane came down on Alex’s hand with a resounding  _ thawp.  _ Alex yelped, yanking the hand in automatically. 

“What the hell?” He yelled, jumping to his feet. “That was right!”

“You hesitated.” Yassen said, unphased by Alex’s anger. “Hesitating in the field will get you killed. You need to know these things. Now sit back down. We aren’t done.”

Alex glared for a moment, before sitting down. He slowly extended his hand again. Before he could react, Yassen brought down the cane again.

Alex cried out, looking up at Yassen in confusion.

“That,” Yassen said, “was for talking back. You should know better.”

Alex deflated under Yassen’s cold gaze.

“Yes sir.” He mumbled, lowering his eyes once again.

Yassen didn’t respond, listing out the description of another poison. The video ended before Alex could answer.

Clint couldn’t decide if this video was better or worse. It wasn’t as overtly violent, but that was almost worse. Yassen smacking that stick into his hand, reminding Alex of what would happen if he failed, seemed cruel. Not only that, but Alex had to hold his own hand out for punishment. The fact that he was willing to do so did not bode well for his mental state. After all, Alex hadn’t been mad that he had been hit, he had been mad because he felt it was undeserved. Clint had to wonder if he would have protested the hit if he had gotten the question wrong. Probably not. 

“Halfway there.” Tony said, trying to sound cheerful and failing miserably. When no one responded, he sighed. 

“Jarvis?”

The AI responded, starting the third video. 

Alex and Yassen were back in the gym from the first video. Alex was on a gymnast horse, holding himself in a handstand. Yassen stood a few feet away, watching him.

“You know, Alex,” he said suddenly. “There really is nothing that is special about you. I mean yes, you are a proficient spy, but that is merely because you have trained from a young age. Any child would be like you with your upbringing.”

He took a step closer to Alex. The teen was shaking. He had obviously been in this position for quite some time. 

  
  
“Arm up.” Yassen said absently. Alex shifted his weight onto his right arm, bringing his left out to his side.

“All the way Alex.” Yassen admonished gently. Alex took a shuddering breath before lifting his arm to be flush with his side. He froze in that position, supporting his entire body on one arm.

Yassen nodded, before continuing. “I mean, there was a time when you seemed like you may be something unique. I’ve read the reports. When you were, seven, was it? Your uncle broke every finger in your left hand, and you didn’t make a single sound. I must say, your pain tolerance is something to be admired Alex.”

Yassen paused, shaking his head regretfully. “But it's all gone downhill from there. You’ve lost much of the toughness that you had as a child. We’ll have to reinstate Ian’s system that he used to build up your pain tolerance.”

Alex made a strangled sound at that, but Yassen ignored it. He got an almost tender look on his face.

“I’m not telling you this to be cruel.” Yassen said gently. “I just need you to understand how much work has been put into you. You were nothing, but through Ian’s efforts and my own, you have become amazing. Or at least, you will be. As long as you don’t waste our work. Do you understand Alex?”

“Yes sir.” Alex’s voice was nearly incomprehensible, but it was good enough for Yassen. He smiled at Alex.

“You may dismount now.” At Yassen’s words, Alex twisted gracefully off of the horse, landing perfectly, standing at attention. 

Yassen looked at Alex carefully. Finally, he nodded.

“I’ll be back tomorrow Alex. Think about what I said. I’m sure you’ll do the right thing.”

With that, Yassen walked out of the room. Alex waited until the man was gone before collapsing to his knees. He threw up, taking gasping, sobbing breaths between bouts of heaving. The video cut out just as Alex began to cry.

Natasha looked like she wanted to kill someone, preferably Yassen Gregorovich. 

“How dare he.” she seethed. It was unclear if she was talking about Ian or Yassen. Both men were despicable in Clint’s opinion.

“Only one left.” Bruce said softly. 

Jarvis seemed to take that as his cue, for the final video began to play. It was a new location, what looked to be a bedroom. Alex was alone, sitting on a bed and reading a book.

The door to the room was slammed open with considerable force. Alex jerked, looking up as Yassen stormed into the room. 

“Sir?” Alex asked uncertainly. It was clear that this was not normal.

Yassen looked absolutely furious. He paced back and forth, muttering in angry russian. Alex sat very still, watching him with his eyes. 

Suddenly, Yassen spun around, staring at Alex.

“You,” he growled, pointing at the boy. “Take-”

The screen cut out, a knife appearing in the center of it. The whole team jumped, turning to see Alex leaning against the doorway of the room.

“Sorry about the screen.” Alex said with a smirk. “I just didn’t think that you would want to see that.”

  
  
“Alex!” Steve said nervously, standing up. “Uh, how long have you been standing there?”

“A while.” Alex said, his expression never changing. “Chill Cap. I don’t mind you watching them. You’d have to be crazy not to. Though I’d like to say that I don’t cry anymore. I grew out of that when I hit my teenage years.”

“We really are sorry.” Bruce said softly. 

“No apologies necessary.” Alex insisted, though his smile seemed a bit more brittle than usual. He suddenly looked thoughtful.

“I am surprised that they kept that footage.” He mused. “It’s pretty incriminating. You’d think that they’d delete it or something.”

Tony’s face suddenly lit up. “That’s it!”

Alex looked at him askance. “What are you going on about?”

“The videos!” Tony said with a grin. “They were hidden within the files. Someone was trying to protect evidence that could be used in your favor!”

Alex looked confused for a second, when a large grin spread across his face. “Smithers.”

“Who?” Steve asked.

“He’s the tech guy at MI6.” Alex explained. “And also the only person in the whole organization that I may be able to call a friend. He has never approved of MI6 using me, and he would have the skills necessary to hide the footage.”

“I’d like to meet this Smithers.” Tony said with an admiring smile. “His programs are beautiful.”

Alex laughed. “I’ll tell him that the next time I see him.” 

Alex suddenly looked uneasy. “Hey, um. You guys can keep those videos or whatever, but could you not watch the last one? It’s… well, it’s kind of personal.”

“Of course.” Steve said immediately. “We should have asked you before we watched any of them.”

Alex waved a hand dismissively. “It’s fine, really. Just… not the last one.”

Alex pushed off of the door frame, standing up straight. “Welp. This has been fun. See ya.”

The team watched as Alex walked out of the room. Natasha made to follow, but Clint held out a hand.

“Let me.” he said in russian. Natasha looked like she was going to argue, but she backed down instead.

Clint walked out of the room, following Alex. It was a testament to how upset the kid was that he was even able to.

Alex ended up in the firing range, hurling knife after knife into the targets. Clint didn’t say anything. He just watched.

Alex finally turned to the archer.

“What do you want Barton?” he asked, crossing his arms.

Clint walked up to Alex, looking down the range. He wasn’t surprised to see that every knife had hit the center of its target. 

“Did your uncle really break all the fingers in your left hand?” he asked bluntly.

Alex got a distant look on his face. “Yes.”

He sighed, sounding almost... nostalgic.

“He was so proud of me.” Alex said wistfully. “He let me have dinner that night, even though he had said I’d go without because I got a 92 on my math test. That was the only time he ever rescinded a punishment.” 

Clint very carefully didn’t react. “Your uncle would withhold food as a punishment?”

Alex snorted. “Why do you think I’m so small? Yeah, Ian said I needed to get used to functioning while hungry. It probably saved my life later on. I was used to pushing through hunger.”

Clint couldn’t stop himself from clenching a fist. He was sure that Alex saw it. Even if he wasn’t some super spy, abused kids always noticed changes in body language that could lead to violence. 

Clint took a deep breath. He turned to Alex, who was looking particularly defensive.

“Do you want to learn how to shoot a bow?”

Alex blinked. It was the first time that Clint had ever seen the kid surprised. 

“Are you sure?” he asked hesitantly. Clint nodded, doing his best to seem nonchalant. 

“Yeah, why not? Could be fun.”

Alex’s answering grin told Clint that he had done the right thing. 


	5. Chapter 5

Clint watched as Alex fired arrow after arrow into the target. Alex couldn’t fire quite as quickly as Clint could, but his skills were already amazing. Clint would have been surprised if it was anyone else, but with Alex, it was just typical. Clint doubted that there was anything in the world that Alex couldn’t do if he put his mind to it.

Still, despite being pleased at Alex’s progress, Clint couldn’t help but feel a little sad. Alex shouldn’t be this good. He shouldn’t feel the urge to practice for hours, shouldn’t feel the urge to be perfect. Clint had told Alex that it didn’t matter how well he did, that they were just having fun, and on the surface Alex seemed to believe that. But Clint knew that there was no way that Alex would accept a substandard performance from himself. Years of impossible standards had erased his ability to do anything ‘just for fun.’

Alex finally lowered the bow, sweating lightly. He peered down the firing range, assessing his shots. Clint stepped forward, following Alex’s line of vision.

“Better.” Clint said with a smile. “Though I think you can tell that aiming with a bow is different from aiming with a gun. You have to account for the wind a bit more, and the arrow will drop more over time. Once you get used to it, your accuracy will be impeccable again. Honestly, it’s already incredible, but somehow I don’t think you’ll accept anything other than perfect.”

Alex nodded, not looking Clint in the eye. Clint sighed mentally. Alex shouldn’t look so disappointed in himself. He could probably final in the world championship for archery, but that wasn’t good enough. Clint cursed the men in Alex’s life that had made him into this. Alex was ridiculously talented and could have been successful in anything he wanted, but because of a couple of a-holes, he thought he would never be good enough. 

“Alex.” Clint said, kneeling to look him in the eye. “I know you won’t believe me, but this is good. This is better than good. I know people who would kill to be this good at archery. You have nothing to be ashamed of, alright?”

Clint always made sure to praise Alex as much as possible during these practice sessions. It wasn’t hard, Alex was the perfect student, and he never needed to be told something twice. Of course, the downside was that Alex was a perfect student because he expected to be punished every time he ‘messed up’. The first time he had fired a bow, he had hit the outer ring of the bullseye. He had immediately flinched, muscles tensing in anticipation of a hit that never happened. 

Clint had never mentioned Alex’s expectation to be punished. He had just continued to teach the kid, praising him liberally when he deserved it, and correcting him gently when he made mistakes.

It had taken a while, but the difference in Alex was obvious. As he slowly began to realize that the Avengers weren’t going to hurt him, he had opened up. Clint actually saw Alex everyday now, and it had been almost a full week since Alex had last pulled his disappearing act. Alex hadn’t just relaxed around Clint, however. He had started to spend more time with each Avenger. As they got to know him better, each member became fiercely protective of Alex. Clint was pretty sure that the Avengers would overthrow a government to keep Alex safe, and that possibility was looking more and more likely everyday.

Alex nodded at Clint’s words, brightening a little. Clint grinned, clapping him on the shoulder. He stood up straight, pressing a button to bring the targets in so they could retrieve the arrows.

“Do you want another round, or are you done for today?” Clint asked, yanking the arrows out of the targets and dropping them in the trough in front of Alex. 

Alex looked thoughtful, plucking at the string of his bow. 

“One more time, I think.” he said finally. “My stamina is still a little low for my tastes. I need to practice firing while tired.”

Clint nodded, sending the targets back out. He didn’t like Alex treating this like a skill he would need in a life or death situation, but he knew that nothing he said would stop Alex from thinking that way. Even if Alex never went on another mission in his entire life, he would always feel the urge to learn more, to get more skills that could potentially save his life.

Alex had just started firing again when the alarm went off. Alex jerked, but his arrow still flew true, hitting the center of the target. He spun, looking at Clint with wide eyes.

“Come on.” Clint said, grabbing his own bow and quiver and running toward the door.

Alex followed Clint up to the main living room where the Avengers were gathering. Tony was already in his suit, talking to SHIElD over the comms.

“What’s going on?” Clint asked Natasha, walking up to her. Alex trailed after him, looking tense and uneasy.

“Doom bots attacking the city.” Natasha said shortly. “They’re calling in the Avengers to deal with it.”

Clint nodded, getting into mission mode. He started going over the weaknesses of the enemy in his head, waiting for the rest of the team to be ready to move out.

“Doom bots?”

Clint startled at Alex’s voice. He had almost forgotten that the teen was there. He turned to look at Alex. The kid looked more anxious than he had ever seen him. He seemed incapable of staying still, his eyes flickering around the room, taking in everything that was happening.

Natasha moved before he could, putting a hand on his shoulder.

“It’s okay Alex.” she said with a smile. “It’s nothing we haven’t dealt with before. It’s just a bit much for the local police. We’ll clean up the streets and be back in no time, alright?”

Alex nodded uncertainly. He looked like he was going to speak when Steve finally walked into the room, the last to arrive.

“Let’s move out!” The Captain yelled, and the whole team headed to the hanger. Clint cast one last look at Alex as he left the room. The kid looked… almost torn. Like he had a difficult decision to make. Clint wasn’t sure what Alex was thinking, but he put it out of his head. He had a mission to concentrate on. He would worry about Alex later.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Alex paced the living room, thinking furiously. It was fine, he was fine. There was no need for him to worry. The Avengers were good at their jobs. Honest. He should just wait here for them to get back.

Alex groaned, tugging his hair. This was ridiculous. Why was he acting like this? He didn’t even care about the Avengers. They were just his ticket to freedom. Or more likely, a quick break before he went back to his hellish existence. He had absolutely no attachment to any of them.

That was Alex’s number one rule: Don’t get attached. He had instigated the rule after Ben had died on a mission from a gunshot to the head. At least it was fast. Ben had been the only person he had left who even kind of cared about him, except for maybe Smithers, and after he died, Alex had been done. He couldn’t handle anymore pain. It seemed that he was doomed to keep living while everyone around him died. Sometimes he thought he sucked luck out of other people and kept it all to himself. It would explain a lot.

So when he had made this crazy plan about using the Avengers to get out of MI6, he had very strictly told himself not to be too friendly, to keep his distance. It wouldn’t do to get attached.

Alex collapsed onto the couch, closing his eyes. Unbidden, each Avenger’s face drifted across his mind. Steve, who was always nice to him, but not in a patronizing way, in a way that made Alex think he was just genuinely nice. Tony, who didn’t treat him any different from anyone else, who was always willing to tease him and joke around with him. Bruce, who understood what it was like to fear yourself, who always answered Alex’s questions, no matter how busy he was. Thor, who told him grand tales of battles that he had fought in, who described Asgard and all the Nine Realms in such a way that Alex thought he might be able to see them if he closed his eyes. Natasha, the only one who really understood, who somehow always knew when he’d had a nightmare, who would hold him and whisper that it wasn’t his fault. And Clint, who taught him the way children were supposed to be taught, with kindness and patience, not with yelling and blows, who had taught him that maybe adults weren’t all bad, that some could be good.

Alex’s eyes flew open and he cursed under his breath. Who was he kidding? He was already attached, way beyond attached as a matter of fact. He jumped to his feet, heading toward the exit. He was not about to lose another family.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Hawkeye watched the battle from the top of a building. He shot a doom bot down without taking his eyes off of the main threat, Dr. Doom himself. Hawkeye snorted to himself. What kind of guy goes around calling himself ‘Dr. Doom?’ And he thought ‘Captain America’ was pretentious. 

Iron Man and Thor were making their way toward Doom, working well as a team. Captain America and Black Widow were on civilian duty, protecting people and clearing the streets of any potential victims. Hulk was on a rampage, destroying doom bots left and right. The rage monster seemed to be having a good time. That was nice. A happy rage monster didn’t go crazy and kill all of his friends. 

Reassured that his team was in good shape, Hawkeye continued his job, sniping any doom bots that got too close to hurting anyone. He had to choose his targets wisely; he had a limited number of arrows after all. Still, overall the battle was going well. Soon they’d be back in Avenger’s Tower, arguing over who had the highest number of kills. 

Of course, the instant Hawkeye thought that was the moment everything went wrong. Dr. Doom roared, and Hawkeye could hear it, even from so far away. As if on cue, thousands on doom bots began to crawl out of the sewers, flooding the streets. 

Hawkeye swore violently, slinging his bow over his back. Where had all of these come from? Why didn’t Doom start with this? It didn’t matter, he needed to get down to the street. He had lost sight of Cap and Black Widow when the doom bots attacked, but he knew that they would need back up. It would be too easy to be swarmed with these kinds of numbers.

Hawkeye ran to the fire escape, only to be thrown backwards by an explosion. He hit the ground hard, and the whole world went black for a second. His vision clearing, he squinted across the roof. The fire escape had been completely destroyed. 

Hawkeye cursed, shoving himself to his feet. Of course. It makes sense that they would target the sniper. Now the need to get off the roof was a little more urgent. 

Hawkeye heard the whistling and ducked just in time. Another section of the rooftop exploded, sending him rolling til he finally came to a stop, perilously close to the edge of the building. He squinted up and finally spotted the drone that was attacking him. The thing banked, coming in for another shot. 

He grabbed his bow, twisting to keep the bot in his line of sight. He fired at the same time as the drone, destroying it a second too late. Hawkeye tried to move, but he wasn’t fast enough. The explosive missed him, but it didn’t miss the building.

The ground gave out beneath him and he started falling. Hawkeye lashed out, managing to grab hold of something solid. His arm wrenched as he came to a sudden stop. He blinked rapidly, clearing his vision as the dust settled. It didn’t look good. He was hanging twenty stories above the ground, holding on with only one hand. The other was holding his bow, which he refused to drop. He would need the thing if he wanted to get out of this alive. 

“Help would be really appreciated.” he managed to spit into the coms. Already holding on was getting difficult. Hawkeye was strong, but no one could support their body weight with just one hand indefinitely. It didn’t help that his entire arm felt like it was on fire from the force of the sudden stop.

“We’ve all got problems.” Iron Man's voice was noticeably strained. “Deal with it yourself.”

“Correction.” Hawkeye grit out. “I am currently dangling above a twenty story drop. If I don’t get some assistance, your sniper is going to end up a smear on the concrete.”

In any other situation, Hawkeye would have found the variety of swears that came over the comms amusing. Who would have guessed that the Captain had such a dirty mouth? Unfortunately, considering the imminent peril he was in, he couldn’t really appreciate it.

A loud groan from the building he was on caught Hawkeyes attention. Suddenly, everything dropped a foot. Hawkeye swore as he struggled to keep his grip.

“Not to rush you guys or anything, but the building is a might bit unstable. As in, it could collapse at literally any second.” Hawkeye said, his voice getting louder and louder until he was shouting.

Before anyone could respond, the building groaned again. The piece of rebar that Hawkeye was holding onto snapped, and he began to fall. Time seemed to freeze for a moment. Hawkeye had always known that he probably wouldn't grow old, but he honestly hadn’t thought he would be dying any time soon. It seemed like a waste. Here he was, part of some super team, and he was brought down by gravity. Ridiculous. 

Any more disparagements of gravity were cast from Hawkeye’s mind when two hands clamped down hard around his wrist, stopping his fall before it really began. He squinted up, curious to see which team member had made it too his location so quickly. Based on the feel of the hands, it was probably Black Widow.

“Thanks.” he rasped out, as he managed to make out a silhouette of his savior. It was still too dusty for him to get a clear look at them.

“No problem. Honestly, how did you ever manage to survive a mission before I came along?”

What the? That sounded like…

“Alex?” Hawkeye asked, staring at the teen in shock. 

“The one and only.” Alex said cheerfully, that signature grin on his face. He grimaced slightly, adjusting his grip on Hawkeye. “Jeez man, think you could lay off on the donuts? You weigh a freaking ton.”

“Don’t you dare drop me.” Hawkeye growled, grabbing hold of of Alex’s wrist to take some of the strain off of the teen.

“Baby.” Alex grunted as he tried to pull Hawkeye back onto the roof. “Afraid of falling twenty stories. Probably wouldn’t even break all the bones in your body.”

“Yeah, just most of them.” Hawkeye muttered.

Alex laughed breathily, still struggling with Hawkeyes weight. Suddenly he tensed, glancing over his shoulder. He swore, letting go on Hawkeye with one hand to grab a gun out of his pocket. He fired at something that Hawkeye couldn’t see.

“Alex? What’s going on?”

“We’ve got company.” Alex said, holstering his gun and grabbing Hawkeye again. “Quit hanging around and come help me.”

Hawkeye frowned, looking around. Alex was braced against a large piece of rubble with his upper body leaning over it to hold onto him. Looking up, Hawkeye could see a piece of metal close to the edge that he could probably use to pull himself back onto the roof.

“Catch.” he called, tossing his bow up. Alex caught it slipping it over his shoulder. With one of his hands now free, Hawkeye began to climb up Alex’s arm, grabbing onto his shoulder. 

“Whoa!” Alex said, stumbling at the sudden change before bracing himself more firmly. “A little warning next time?”

“Now… who’s the… baby?” Hawkeye panted, focusing on his goal. Pushing off of Alex’s shoulder, he grabbed the metal he had spotted. Keeping a firm grip, he swung his legs up, getting one of them onto more stable territory. Alex grabbed him, yanking him farther onto the roof. 

Hawkeye lay on the roof for a second, trying to catch his breath. Alex hovered over him, looking for injuries. Hawkeye was about to push him away when he spotted a doom bot crawling onto the roof. 

He reacted instantly, grabbing Alex’s gun and firing at the machine. It toppled over, destroyed, but more appeared. Alex spun and cursed as he saw the swarm approaching.

“Here.” He said, handing Hawkeye his bow and grabbing the gun, taking down six more bots before it ran out of bullets. 

Hawkeye rolled to his knees, firing almost before he was fully upright. Alex reloaded his gun in the blink of an eye and was firing again, a second gun joining the first. 

“What are you doing here?” Hawkeye asked. He aimed carefully and took out three doom bots, the arrow tearing through them one after another.

“Saving your life, apparently.” Alex said, reloading his guns again. “Is this really the best time?”

“Considering we may die, yes I’d say that it is!” Hawkeye yelled. He hesitated before firing an explosive arrow at the swarm. The last thing this building needed was another explosion, but they were getting scarily close to overrun. 

“We need to get off the roof.” he said, turning to Alex now that they had a little breathing room. “How’d you get up here?”

Alex nodded to the opposite side of the roof. “I went as high as I could from the inside then freestyled it up the side of the building. It wasn’t too hard.”

“Of course.” Hawkeye ran a hand through his hair. “Not sure I can do that with my arm. How are you doing on ammo?”

“Got enough to take down a foreign embassy.” Alex said cheerfully. 

Hawkeye raised an eyebrow. That was a surprisingly useful measurement when it came to ammunition. 

  
  
“Alright. Well, good on that front then.” He muttered, looking around the roof. He groaned as he saw some more bots approaching.

“Guys? How are you doing. Cause I would really like that help right around now.” He said into the comm, backing up a bit with Alex aiming his two handguns at the bots.

“We’re doing our best.” Black Widow said. “Hang on a bit longer.”

Hawkeye was a bit confused before he realized the others thought he was still dangling. 

  
  
“Uh… good news. I’m on the roof again. Bad news, Alex is the one who saved me. And we are being overrun.”

“WHAT?” Iron Man yelled. “What is Alex doing there?”

“Good question!” Hawkeye yelled back, firing as fast as he was capable of firing. “Why don’t you come ask him yourself?”

“That’s it. This needs to end.” Cap said darkly. “Thor, go back up Hawkeye and Alex. Iron Man, take Doom down. Now.”

“With pleasure.” Iron Man said, and distantly Hawkeye heard the sound of explosions. He smirked. Doom was, well, doomed. Now one messed with Alex when the Avengers were around. 

Alex was a whirlwind. As the doom bots got closer, he abandoned his guns, pulling out his knives and going on the offensive. Pretty soon Hawkeye was fighting up close as well. There just wasn’t enough room to maneuver on the rooftop. Having Alex was a blessing. The kid was a one man army, tearing through the doom bots like they were paper. But even with their skill, there was only so much they could do against superior numbers.

They ended up back to back, the doom bots surrounding them. Alex was breathing heavily, blood dripping down from a cut on his face.

“This has been fun.” He muttered, glaring at the machines. His grip on his knives tightened and loosened as he tried to get his breathing under control.

“Yeah,” Hawkeye agreed, equally winded. He clutched an arrow in his hand, ready to stab the first thing that came into stabbing distance. “Ready for more?”

Alex smirked, but before he could answer, there was a crack of thunder. Lightening split across the sky before shooting down to hit the doom bots, shorting them out. Thor landed in front of them, looking a little battle worn, but mostly just exhilarated. Which was typical when it came to the god. Nothing made Thor happier than a good old fashioned battle.

“Friends! Are you unharmed?” He asked, walking up to the human duo.

“Great timing buddy!” Alex said with a grin. “I’ll admit, that wasn’t looking too great.”

At that moment, a yell echoed across the battlefield. They all turned to see that Iron Man had managed to bring Doom down. Iron Man was clearly yelling at Doom, probably threatening him. It must have worked, for doom bots all across the city shut down, going limp. Hawkeye breathed a sigh of relief. It was over.

The next half hour was a blur. SHIELD was everywhere, getting rid of the bots and taking Dr. Doom away. Hawkeye had tried to scare the medics away, but unfortunately they were more afraid of Black Widow than they were of him, so when Nat demanded he be looked over, they obliged. He was fine, his arm a little strained, but nothing that an ice pack and a good night’s sleep wouldn’t fix. He had some bruises and cuts from the fight, but nothing serious.

Alex was better off than he was. He had that cut on his forehead, but that was about it. He didn’t even have any bruises really, which Clint thought was incredibly unfair. But mostly, he was just glad that the kid was okay. 

As soon as all the Avengers were cleared, they gathered around Alex, glaring at him with various levels of intensity. Alex looked at them sheepishly. 

“What?” He asked innocently.

“Alex, why did you follow us?” Natasha asked. “You say you want out of the spy life, then you go and pull a stunt like this?”

“I would think you’d be glad that I came.” Alex muttered. “Barton would be dead otherwise.”

“We are grateful.” Steve said earnestly. “But you have to understand that this isn’t your job anymore Alex.”

“I know that!” Alex yelled, looking angry. “But I couldn’t just sit there when I knew I could be helping.”

“We don’t need your help.” Tony said. “Honestly kid, what were you thinking?”

“I was thinking that I couldn’t lose another family!’ Alex yelled. 

The whole team went silent. Alex looked away, wiping at tears that were dripping down his face.

“Everyone… everyone I’ve ever cared about is dead.” He said quietly. “And I… I can’t… I can’t lose another family. I just, I just can’t.”

Clint moved before anyone else. He set his bow and quiver aside before very carefully wrapping his arms around Alex. Alex tensed for a second before melting into the embrace, grabbing onto Clint and holding as if he was afraid that Clint would disappear the moment he let go.

“We’re not going anywhere Alex.” Clint whispered. “I promise.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A figure froze the screen on a scene of the Avengers leaving triumphant from their latest battle. In the middle of the group was a young child.

“He’s with the Avengers sir.” The figure said, turning to look at the man standing behind him.

The man nodded, staring at the screen.

“Contact Cossack.” He said finally. “Tell him we’ve found our runaway.”


	6. Chapter 6

“MOVIE NIGHT!” Tony yelled, throwing an arm over Clint’s shoulder. Clint shoved him off, rolling his eyes. Tony yelped, almost falling over before recovering his balance. 

“Why?” He whined, giving Clint a wounded look. They both jumped at a sudden peal of laughter, spinning to see Alex standing right behind them. Their startled expressions only made Alex laugh harder. 

“You’re gonna give me a heart attack someday, kid.” Tony muttered, ruffling Alex’s hair. Alex huffed, shoving Tony’s hand away and running his fingers through his hair. Alex acted annoyed, but Clint knew that he had allowed Tony to touch him. It was honestly a good sign that Alex was reacting well to casual touch. Clint was pretty sure that no one had touched him once in the entire first month Alex had lived in the tower.

“You said something about a movie night?” Alex said innocently, a glint of mischief in his eyes. Tony brightened visibly at the reminder.

“Yeah! I want to get Capiscle caught up on some pop culture, so we’re watching Star Wars tonight! I can’t believe he still hasn’t seen them. Come on, let’s get it all set up, the others should be here soon.”

Tony ran off, Clint and Alex following behind. Clint glanced at Alex. The kid seemed to be in a good mood today. Of course, it was hard to tell for certain. Alex was the kind of person who could get shot and keep smiling. Still, Clint liked to think he knew the kid well enough to be able to tell when he was faking it. 

Clint and Alex walked into the living room. They both frowned. Something was wrong. It was incredibly dark, the lights not turning on as they should have. 

“Tony?” Clint called, looking for the man. 

“Here.” His voice came from near the television. “I’m working on it.”

“What happened?” Clint asked, entering the room cautiously. Alex followed close behind, tension obvious in the way he held himself. His eyes flickered around the room, looking for threats. Clint really hoped this wasn’t a prank or something. Anyone who tried to scare them would probably be met with a knife to the face. 

“No clue.” Tony muttered. He sounded distinctly put out. “Power isn’t being delivered to this one room for some reason. Can’t figure out what’s caused it. Jarvis doesn’t know either.”

Before Clint could respond, Alex was pushing him down. A knife flew over his head, embedding itself in the wall behind him.

A soft chuckle filled the room. 

“Very good Alex. Nice to see that you haven’t lost any of your reflexes while you’ve been away.”

Alex didn’t say anything, standing protectively in front of Clint. To most people, his face would appear emotionless, but Clint could see the tension and fear in how he stood.

Tony stood slowly, hands in the air. “Uhhh… Hey stranger. Mind introducing yourself?”

“Oh, of course. Apologies, that was ever so rude of me.”

A man stood from one of the armchairs in the room, striding forward into the light. Clint had already guessed, but that didn’t make him feel any better when Yassen Gregorovich smiled at him. 

“Clint Barton. It is an honor to meet you.”

“Likewise.” Clint said shortly. He did not like this. He was at a severe disadvantage right now. He was unarmed and unprepared for a confrontation like this. Tony was in a similar situation. Normally his house was weapon enough, but they couldn’t count on that right now with the power cut. Alex was their best bet at the moment (the kid was a walking arsenal) but Clint wasn’t optimistic about Alex’s odds.

“Ah.” Tony said cheerfully. “You’re that assassin guy. You trained Alex. Excellent job by the way. He’s a little terrifying.”

Yassen tilted his head in acknowledgement.

“Thank you.” the deadly man said. “It’s… nice to have my work appreciated.”

“ Kwa nini uko hapa?”(1) Alex suddenly asked. Clint’s brow furrowed. He was pretty sure that was Swahili, but he wasn’t sure. It wouldn’t surprise him if Alex picked a language he knew that Clint didn’t know.

Whatever Alex had said, Yassen looked faintly amused by it. “Je, unapigana nami Alex? Sisi wote tunajua jinsi itaenda."(2)

Alex scowled. He looked like he was about to say something else, but he backed down instead. He relaxed his posture, going out of a fighting stance. Clint wasn’t sure what Yassen had said, but whatever it was, it had convinced Alex not to fight.

“Care to share with the class?” Tony asked, lowering his arms slightly. 

Yassen waved a dismissive hand.

“Ah, just banter between student and teacher. Nothing you need concern yourself with. We have more important things to discuss.”

Yassen sat down on the couch, looking completely at ease. Clint snorted mentally. Well two could play at that game. He leaned against the door frame of the room crossing his arms. Alex glanced at him before walking further into the room. He perched himself on the edge of a chair, posture ramrod straight. Tony shrugged before sitting down in another chair. He steepled his fingers, looking at Yassen.

“Go on.” The millionaire said. 

“Tell me.” Yassen said. “What do you think the reaction would be if it got out that the Avengers were shielding a terrorist?”

  
  
“What do you think the reaction would be if people found out that the ‘terrorist’ was fourteen and had been abused by the British government?” Clint shot back. He had seen Alex tense at Yassen’s words and it frankly pissed him off.

“So that’s how we’re playing it?” Yassen said, still sounding amused. “You are willing to go up against MI6?”

“Honestly? Yes.” Tony said. “So if you think Alex is leaving this building with you, think again.”

“Relax.” Yassen said with a smile. “I would never force Alex to do anything against his will.”

Alex’s fingers twitched at that. Clint’s eyes narrowed. That was the equivalent of a scream when it came to Alex.

“Right.” Clint drawled. “Well, if that was all you had to say, we were kind of busy.”

“Of course.” Yassen said, standing up. “I would hate to infringe on your time. I’ll get out of your hair.”

Yassen walked across the room, stopping next to Alex.

“Fikiria juu yake Alex. Je, uko tayari kuhatarisha watu zaidi?”(3)

Alex shuddered, looking up at Yassen. The assassin smiled and ran a hand down Alex’s cheek. The boy flinched violently. Yassen’s smile became a smirk.

“Nilikukosa,”(4) he said softly before walking out of the room. He paused in the doorway. 

“Nitasubiri, Alex.”(5) Then he was gone. 

Tony let out a long breath.

“Okay. So. We’ve been found out. That’s… okay. We’ll figure it out.”

Clint ignored Tony’s rambling, walking over to Alex and crouching in front of him. 

“You good?” He asked, careful not to touch Alex. He sincerely doubted that would be welcomed at the moment. 

Alex stared at him blankly. Clint frowned, snapping his fingers in front of Alex’s face. No reaction.

Clint cursed. He had seen this before. Alex was gone, stuck in the nightmares that inhabited his mind. Clint held out a hand hesitantly before retreating. He wasn’t sure that he and Alex were close enough for him to be able to pull Alex out of a flashback safely. It would probably be better to just let it run its course. He stood up, ignoring Tony’s questions about Alex’s well being. 

“Jarvis, contact the rest of the team. We need to talk to Fury.”

“What about Alex?” Tony asked. “We can’t just… leave him like that.”

“Yes we can.” Clint said grimly. “Trust me, it’s better to just let him work through it. We’ll only make it worse. Don’t touch him, don’t talk to him, don’t even get close. I’d hate to have to dispose of your body.”

“Ah, right.” Tony said, backing a few steps away from Alex.

Clint looked at Alex one last time before heading out to find Nat. They had things to do if they wanted to keep Alex safe. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Alex wasn’t sure why he was so panicked. He had expected this to happen. He had known that Yassen would eventually hunt him down and drag him back to MI6. He hadn’t expected to really escape the organization. So why was he so shocked now?

Alex felt the ghost of Yassen’s hand on his face and bit back the urge to vomit. He  _ hated  _ Yassen’s hands. He hated when they touched him. He had finally managed to, well not forget, but at least ignore the memory of what Yassen’s hands felt like, and now they were back. Alex wanted to claw his face off, anything to remove the memory of those hands.

Memories buffeted Alex, memories of pain and fear. He shoved them down like he always did, but it was much harder now. Yassen’s presence had brought them all to the forefront of his mind. The one part of his mind that wasn’t a garbled mess resigned itself to watching his worst memories play through once again. 

Alex wasn’t sure how long he stuck in his own head. It had been years since he had an attack this bad. All he knew was that one moment he was in the desert watching his best friend die, and the next he was sitting in Avengers tower, surrounded by a variety of super soldiers and assassins. 

Alex blinked, his eyes smarting. However long he’d been out of it, his eyes had been open the whole time. It hurt, but he didn’t really care. He had bigger issues to worry about. He looked around, trying to figure out what had happened after Yassen left. The Avengers were looking at a screen and Alex realized that they were talking to Fury.

“But why?” Steve was saying. “Why show their hand? Yassen could have snuck in and taken Alex without any of us even noticing. All they’ve done is remove the element of surprise.”

“They don’t want to take me by force.”

If Alex had been in a better frame of mind, he would have found the Avenger’s collective jump amusing. As it was, he was a bit too busy thinking over MI6’s strategy to really appreciate it. 

Natasha was the only one to be unaffected.

“Welcome back.” She said with a slight smile. Alex smiled back weakly. 

“What do you mean?” Steve asked.

Alex rolled his shoulders, releasing some of the tension.

“I’m a highly effective agent.” Alex said matter of factly. “If I went rouge, MI6 would have a lot of problems.”

“And now you’ve run away.” Clint said, understanding filling his face.

“Yep.” Alex nodded. “They need me to be willing. If they took me back forcefully, they have no guarantee that I wouldn’t just run away again.”

Alex stood up, cracking his back. “This was about sending a message.”

He started to walk out of the room, ignoring the protests of various Avengers.

“Where are you going?” Natasha asked, her voice cutting through the others’.

Alex paused at the doorway. He glanced back into the room.

“I’m going to tell them message received.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Clint paced back and forth, thinking wildly. He growled, kicking a table in frustration. He immediately swore as pain shot through his foot.

“It’s your own fault.” Natasha said unsympathetically. Clint rolled his eyes, collapsing onto the couch next to her. 

They sat in silence for several long minutes, neither willing to bring up the cause of Clint’s frustration. Finally Clint spoke.

“When did you last see him?” He asked softly. 

“Two days ago.” Natasha said. Her voice was empty of inflection, but Clint could tell she was upset. 

Yassen’s visit had had an immediate and terrible effect on Alex. The kid had withdrawn again, acting the same way he had when he’d first entered the tower. After Yassen’s visit, none of them saw Alex for three full days. Jarvis had insisted that he was still in the tower, but that didn’t stop them from worrying. 

“This has to end.” Clint said miserably. “We can’t keep Alex in the tower forever. He needs to go to school, have friends his own age, see a therapist, something! Keeping him locked up isn’t going to do him any good in the long run.”

“I doubt anything will be much help in the long run.” Natasha said sadly. “Alex will never be normal.”

Clint opened his mouth to protest, only to close it. Natasha was right. Alex never would be normal. The scars went too deep.

“That doesn’t mean we should just give up on him.” Clint finally said.

Natasha nodded, but she didn’t say anything. They were all discouraged by their lack of progress when it came to Alex. 

“It’ll be okay. Right Nat? Alex will be okay.”

Natasha never responded.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Yassen walked into MI6 headquarters. It was still rather amusing for him to be able to enter this place without restriction. He was waved through and entered the elevator, heading up.

He walked down the hall, entering an office without knocking. There was no point. The residents of the office knew he was here.

“Cossack.”

Yassen nodded in acknowledgement, standing in front of the desk.

“Message delivered. Though it doesn’t seem to have had any affect. Alex does not intend to return.”

Blunt nodded thoughtfully. 

“Well then. Let’s change his mind.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1: Why are you here?  
> 2: Are you going to fight me Alex? We both know how that will go.  
> 3: Think about it Alex. Are you ready to risk more people?  
> 4: I missed you.  
> 5: I'll be waiting Alex.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I... have no excuse. Literally, this story is complete, I have no excuse. Darn that depression! Always making me give up on things I genuinely enjoy! But thank you to humor who is always there to help me cope.
> 
> Anyway, enjoy? I'll try to get the rest out in a semi-regular manor. I'm going on vacation over Thanksgiving break, so maybe not til December. Sorry...

Clint leaned back in his chair, balancing it on two legs. He stared blankly at the ceiling, trying to figure out something to do. Normally he would be training, but he had gotten injured on a solo mission a couple of days ago and he wasn’t supposed to aggravate the injury. His instinct was to ignore that instruction, but Natasha had taken to following him everywhere, watching him and making sure he didn’t over do anything. And despite what he may say when he’s drunk, she is a better operative than him. So yeah. He was stuck sitting around doing practically nothing. 

He glanced over to the corner where Alex was fiddling with… something. Clint couldn’t see it clearly from here and Alex hid it every time someone came close. Clint didn’t really care what Alex was doing. He was just glad the kid was hanging around him again.

Clint getting injured had shocked Alex out of his distant mood. He had taken to following Clint everywhere, never really talking to him, but always keeping him within eyesight. It honestly warmed Clint’s heart to see that Alex cared, in his own weird way.

Clint stretched, forgetting his precarious position. He yelped as his chair started to tip over, but Natasha caught it before he could hit the ground.

“And you wonder why I refuse to leave you alone.” She chided, setting the chair upright again. Clint flipped her off, ignoring the snickers coming from Alex’s corner.

“You’re being overprotective.” He muttered, shifting in his chair.

“You got shot.” She said bluntly. 

“Just in the shoulder.” Clint protested. “It didn’t even hit anything vital, straight through and through. The best bullet wound a person could hope for.”

“Except for the kind that doesn’t exist.” Natasha said, refusing to back down. “You’re on stand by til you’re cleared by a doctor. That’s final. So if I catch you trying to sneak into the firing range again…”

Nat paused, before smirking evilly. “I’ll set Alex on you.”

Clint froze, glancing over at Alex again.

“You wouldn’t dare.” he hissed, inching away from the teen.

“I’ve got twenty three different ways to… convince you to relax and heal.” Alex said, not looking up from whatever he was messing with. He paused, flashing Clint a wink. “And I can guarantee you will not like them.”

“Fine! You guys win.” Clint groaned, exasperated. “I’ll just sit here like a lump on a log.”

There was dead silence for a moment before both Natasha and Alex burst into laughter.

“What?” Clint whined.

“A lump on a log?” Alex finally managed to sputter. “Where did that come from?”

“It’s a saying.” Clint muttered defensively.

“Yeah, in Hicksville USA.” Alex said. “Careful Barton, you’re letting your roots show.”

Clint huffed, but secretly he was glad that Alex was smiling again. It had been a rough month after Yassen’s visit, but it looked like the worst was over. Now if they could just get MI6 to back down…

“I wish Tony was here.” Clint grumbled. “At least he knows how to have a good time.”

“When he doesn’t lock himself in the lab for three days straight, sure.” Natasha said with a smirk. Clint groaned.

“Do you have to contradict everything I say?” he asked, throwing a dramatic arm over his face.

“No.” Natasha said cheerfully. “You just make it so easy.”

Clint flipped her off again, not bothering to remove his other arm from its location on his face. He would kill to be out with the other Avengers right now. They had been called out to deal with some terrorist group in Yemen, and he had to stay behind because of his stupid shoulder. Nat had stayed to babysit him. And technically Alex too, but none of them really thought he needed supervision.

“Excuse me, but there is an alert on Level 24.”

All three spies stiffened at Jarvis’s voice. 

“What kind of alert?” Natasha asked, getting to her feet and pulling out a gun.

“The motion sensors were set off in lab 3-A. I would give you more information, but the cameras have stopped working in that area.”

“3-A? That’s the robotics lab. Sure it isn’t just DUM-E?” Alex asked, also getting to his feet.

“That is a possibility.” Jarvis admitted. “But with the cameras nonfunctional, it seemed proper to notify you.”

“I’ll check it out.” Natasha said. “Just in case. Alex, stay here and make sure birdbrain doesn’t injure himself further.”

“Hey!” Clint protested. Alex and Natasha both ignored him. Alex mock saluted Natasha before sitting back down on the floor. The thing he had been fiddling with was gone, a knife in its place. Clint really needed to figure out where Alex stored all of his weaponry. It was like freaking magic the way he could squirrel stuff away. 

The two fell into a companionable silence. They weren’t really worried. Odds were it was just a malfunction. No one would be able to get into Stark Tower undetected, and even if they did, Natasha would be more than a match for them.

_ Yassen got in.  _ Clint’s mind whispered.  _ And you can’t be sure Nat would win against him. _

Clint batted the thought away. Sure, Yassen did infiltrate the tower, but he was a legend. No one else would be able to. And why would Yassen break in again? Everything was fine. Nat would be back in a minute with some story about how DUM-E knocked over a fire extinguisher and covered all the cameras in foam or something like that. 

Still, Clint couldn’t quite shake his uneasy feeling. His instincts had never steered him wrong before, and right now they were screaming at him. He was about to mention it to Alex when Jarvis spoke up again.

“Weapons discharged on Level 24.”

“What?” Clint yelled, jumping to his feet. “What happened?”

“I don’t know. The camera outage has spread to the entirety of Level 24.”

Clint was moving before Jarvis finished, heading to the stairs. Alex was right beside him, knives gripped in his hands.

“I’m sure she’s fine.” Alex said softly. 

“Off course she is.” Clint snorted. “Doesn’t make me any less pissed that someone had the nerve to attack her.”

Clint really wasn’t worried. He couldn’t imagine that there was anyone in the tower capable of taking Nat out. Still, it never hurt to be cautious. Overconfidence was the number one killer in their profession.

Alex nodded, humming vaguely. It occurred to Clint that maybe he shouldn’t bring a fourteen year old into an active combat situation, but he dismissed the thought. Alex would come no matter what he said. At least this way he could keep an eye on the kid.

They reached Level 24 and slowed down, looking around. Clint was technically unarmed, but that didn’t make him any less dangerous. Besides, he was pretty sure that Alex had some sort of pointy thing he could borrow if push came to shove.

As if he’d read his mind, Alex handed Clint one of his knives, pulling a new one from… somewhere. 

Clint nodded his thanks, feeling more secure with a weapon in his hand. The power had gone out completely, making Level 24 look like something out of a horror film. The lights flickered occasionally, so it wasn’t pitch black, but it certainly wasn’t good visibility. Clint was uncomfortably reminded of Yassen’s break in once more.

Alex tapped him lightly on the shoulder, getting his attention. He tapped his own chest before gesturing to the left, rising a questioning eyebrow. Clint thought for a moment before nodding. Alex grinned, his teeth glinting in the low light, before taking off down the left hallway, his footsteps absolutely silent. 

Clint headed to the right, stepping lightly. Jarvis hadn’t been able to give them any information, so they would have to search the whole floor. They could just head to lab 3-A, but that was likely what Nat had done, and it apparently hadn’t ended well. Any hostiles would expect backup to follow Nat’s path, so it was best for them to wind their way toward the lab in a different way. 

Clint cursed his injured shoulder once more as he crept through the halls. He knew that he wasn’t at his best. He could still fire a bow with this injury, but it would hurt like the devil and probably do further damage to his shoulder. It really sucked to be in a potentially dangerous situation without his bow. Still, he was nothing if not adaptable. He would make do. At least he had a weapon, even if it was just a knife.

He grinned as he thought of what Alex would do if he could hear Clint disparaging one of his precious blades. If anyone wanted proof that knives could be just as deadly as guns, they only had to spend fives minutes in Alex’s company. The kid could do some scary things with a switchblade.

A distant sound brought Clint’s focus back to the present situation. He frowned, approaching the sound carefully. He was getting close to the lab and so far he hadn’t spotted any evidence of a struggle.

That ended once he actually entered the lab. His vision immediately honed in on the limp body lying on a table.

“Nat!” He rushed forward, checking her vitals. He let out a breath when he felt her pulse, strong and steady. She was just unconscious. But why would someone knock her out and then just leave her here?

He realized his mistake a second too late. He started to spin around, but jerked when he felt something prick his neck. He grabbed at the dart, yanking it out, but it was too late. His vision started to blur and he swayed on his feet. Alex’s knife clattered to the ground as his grip weakened. Drugs.

He scrambled for his phone. If he could alert the other Avengers… 

“I don’t think so.” A distant voice said, pulling the phone from his weak grip. Clint tried to attack the man, but he missed entirely, his vision too blurry to give him a good read on the man. His knees suddenly gave out, and he would have hit the floor if the same man hadn’t caught him. 

He struggled in the grip, refusing to give up even as his vision started to blink out. The man chuckled.

“You are a strong one. Very determined.” Clint went limp as he felt something sharp touch the edge of his throat. A knife. It might even be the same one he had dropped a moment ago. That would be ironic. 

“Ah. Hello Alex. Nice of you to join us.”

Alex? Clint tried to open his eyes, but they were too heavy. Things were starting to get really confusing.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.” What? Do what? “I would hate for something to happen to this fine young man.” 

Clint flinched as the blade pressed a hair harder. He felt blood start to trickle down his throat. It tickled. He wanted to brush it away, but his arms were just too heavy.

“NO!” Huh. That sounded like Alex. “Don’t hurt him! I’ll come with you, just leave them alone.”

Oh. Oh no. Clint finally realized what was going on. He wanted to yell, to tell Alex to leave them and run. They weren’t worth it. But he couldn't move. Even if he had been able to, he was sure that Alex would ignore him. The kid was too stubborn for his own good.

“... glad you… see reason.” 

Clint’s hearing was starting to wane. Soon he would be completely unconscious. He made one last effort to get up, to fight, to do anything, but it was useless. Whatever drug they used, it wasn’t one that he had a resistance to. There was nothing that he could do.

His last hope before he completely passed out was that Jarvis would realize something was wrong. If he could get the other Avengers back soon, they may have a chance at getting out of this relatively unscathed. If not…

_ Stark,  _ Clint thought blearily.  _ You really need to upgrade your security.  _

And then it all went black. 


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNING! This is the chapter that is prolly most controversial of this story. It discusses sexual abuse of a minor so if that bothers you, DON'T READ IT! It's not going to be anything graphic at all, but still. It's a sensitive subject and the person in question does not deal with it in anything approaching a healthy way. So consider yourself warned.

Alex had often heard people speak of 'waking up slowly.' It was a pretty common phrase in both books and spoken conversation, so he could only assume that it was a fairly common phenomenon. Personally, he had no idea what that would be like. For as long as he could remember, he had woken from sleep suddenly, no grogginess or confusion, just instant alertness. Even after getting wacked in the head, he always woke with complete awareness of himself and his surroundings.

So when he woke up tied to a chair, he wasn't scared or confused. He knew that he had been kidnapped by Scorpia (again) and that he would have to escape before they began torturing him (again). The thought crossed his mind that he should probably be a little more worried about his current situation, but he dismissed it. Getting kidnapped was par for the course for him. If he got upset every time it happened, he'd be in a constant state of anxiety. Personally, he thought that if someone really wanted him out of the way, they should just kill him, but people seemed to be fixated on the whole kidnapping thing. Whatever. Criminal ineptitude was the only reason he was still alive. He wasn't about to start complaining about it.

There  _ was  _ a slight hitch in the proceedings this time. Clint and Natasha had been taken too. He'd have to get them out as well, which was a little annoying, but not really a problem. Nat and Clint were both highly effective agents. Who knows, maybe they would end up rescuing him before he could rescue them. Honestly, it was probably just a matter of who had a lucky break first.

Still, no point in waiting around. Alex took stock of his surroundings. He was in an empty white room. There was nothing in it except for the chair he was sitting in and two other chairs. All of the chairs were bolted to the floor, which was aggravating but not surprising. He flexed his hands and winced as his wrists started bleeding. They had tied him up with wire. Fun. Better not move too much then. He didn't want to permanently screw up his hands.

He was considering his options when he heard approaching footsteps. He instantly went limp, faking unconsciousness. He had recognized the drug they used, and they wouldn't expect him to be awake yet. Better not to give away his advantage.

The door to the room opened and Alex could hear multiple people entering the room. He cracked his eyes open and saw that they were dragging someone into the room.  _ Natasha.  _ A second set entered, pulling Clint's limp body with them. Both spies were dumped on the other chairs in the room and promptly tied up with wire.

Great. There wasn't really anything Alex could do to stop it, but that didn't mean he was happy about watching them get tied up. If he had woken up just a little bit earlier, he wouldn't have been restrained yet, and they would already be gone. It was incredibly bad luck. Apparently these guys weren't as stupid as he thought, considering they made sure to secure him first. Or maybe they were more stupid for neglecting Black Widow and Hawkeye. Honestly, people can say what they want, but in the end, who survives really comes down to who was more lucky. All the skill in the world won't save you from sheer dumb luck. Usually Alex was the lucky one, but this time it looks like Scorpia had won.

"Alright. Time to wake them up. Boss wants to talk to them."

What? Alex squinted through nearly closed eyes and saw someone approaching with a needle. Oh no. It was probably some accelerant designed to counteract the drug, but considering he had already worked the drug out of his system, odds were it would do him some serious damage, maybe even kill him. Looked like he had to give up the game.

"Not necessary. I'm awake." Alex said, sitting up straight. The man in front of him cursed, jerking back and dropping the syringe. It shattered on the ground.

"What the-" the guard backed away, swearing violently under his breath. The others jumped as well, a few giving Clint and Natasha suspicious looks. Alex smirked.

"Don't worry, they're not awake." He paused, his grin becoming a little more evil. "You'd be dead if they were."

Strangely, the guards didn't seem comforted. They exchanged uneasy looks before approaching the two assassins. They injected them as quickly as possible before moving out of reach. Alex found the whole thing highly entertaining.

"The boss will be in to speak to you soon." One of the guards said. "In the meantime…"

He trailed off, looking around the room. None of the other guards would meet his gaze. He swore quietly before walking to the door, yanking it open and looking into the hallway.

"Oi! Stan! Get in here!"

Another guard walked into the room, a big hulking man who looked like he could crush Alex's skull with one hand. The first guard looked highly pleased with himself.

"Stan will watch you til the boss is ready. So don't get any ideas."

Alex snorted mentally. Okay, so maybe the men who had taken them from the tower were Scorpia, but these guys definitely were not. Not really surprising. Scorpia was having some real problems these days, mostly due to Alex. They just didn't have the manpower that they used to, which meant they had to hire idiots like these.

The first guard stood there awkwardly for a moment before leaving the room. The other guards followed, some looking a tad too eager to be out of Alex's presence. Stan leaned against the wall next to the door, glaring at the teen spy.

Alex didn't react at all. He ignored 'Stan' and turned to look at Clint and Natasha. Clint was starting to wake, and he gave it five minutes before Natasha was up as well. Good. They could start working on a plan to get out of here.

Alex waited patiently. He was good at that. He could tell when Clint became aware of what was going on.

"Before you ask, we've been kidnapped by Scorpia. And no, I'm not sure how they managed to get into the tower."

Clint twisted to look at Alex, scowling slightly.

"Great. Fan-freaking-tastic. Where's Nat?"

"I'm right here."

Clint swore, turning to look at Natasha, who was glaring at Stan. The guard leered back, not looking the least bit intimidated. Like Alex said. Idiots.

"Well, there's that at least." Clint muttered.

"I would suggest we escape." Alex said helpfully. "That guy over there may be a moron, but the people he works for are not. And they don't like me very much."

Clint nodded and started muttering to Natasha, tossing out ideas that she proceeded to poke holes in. Alex listened idly, his gaze roaming the room as he searched for ideas. He noticed that Stan was glaring at him again. Wait… no. He recognized that look.

Alex smirked internally. This was going to be easy.

"Never mind." He whispered to Clint. "I've got this."

Clint gave him a confused look, but before he could say anything, Alex sprang into action.

"Ex-excuse me? Sir? Um… I don't really know what's going on. Can I please go home?"

Stan laughed, shaking his head. "Did you really think that would work? Come on kid, I'm a professional."

"Please!" Alex begged. "Please, I'll do anything!"

"Oh really?" Stan pushed himself away from the wall, walking closer. He stopped in front of Alex, giving him a once over that left very little to be imagined when it came to his intentions. "Anything?"

"Get away from him!" Clint yelled, fury written in every line of his figure. Alex glanced at Clint, confusion written over his features.

"What… I don't understand…"

Comprehension filled his face, and Alex flushed bright red.

"Oh! I-I don't know…"

Stan placed a hand on Alex's upper thigh and squeezed it. "Don't worry kid. I'll be gentle." The way he was looking at Alex seemed to contradict that statement.

Alex hesitated a moment longer before nodding. "Okay…"

"Alex!" Clint yelled. "What do you think you're-"

"Clint!" Natasha yelled. "Shut up."

"What?" Clint sputtered. "But Nat-"

Natasha's glare was enough to shut Clint up. They both watched as Stan unwrapped the wire from around Alex's hands. He kept a firm grip on Alex's arm, not trusting the boy not to make a run for it. Alex just sat there, looking appropriately lost and unsure until his feet were free as well. Then he moved, grabbing the gun from Stan's holster in one smooth move, dismantling it and jamming it into Stan's neck where he was still leaning over Alex. Stan made a strange gurgling noise before keeling over. He was dead before he hit the ground.

"Idiot." Alex said, rolling his eyes before standing up. He examined his wrists clinically, curious to see how much damage had been done.

"WHY DID YOU DO THAT?" Clint yelled, staring at Alex with wide eyes. Alex's brow furrowed.

"Well, I guess it's kind of a nasty way to kill someone, but I figured a gunshot would draw unwanted attention, and I didn't have a whole lot of other options. I mean, did you even look at the guy? He's built like a frigging truck."

"Not that!" Clint yelled. He paused, thinking about it. "Okay, yes that, but I meant all the stuff before!"

"Oh that." Alex said, the confusion leaving his face. He started freeing Clint from the wire as he talked. "Well, it was the easiest way to get out of the restraints. If you're asking how I knew it would work, I recognized the way he was looking at me. No one is easier to manipulate than a horny idiot. Honestly, I barely have to try with them. It's almost disappointingly easy."

Done freeing Clint, Alex moved over to Nat. She hadn't said a thing since telling Clint to shut up. Alex was grateful for that. He hadn't anticipated how Clint would react to Alex's falsehood. It made sense that the archer wouldn't be used to that kind of thing, but Nat was different. If anyone would understand that method of manipulation, it would be the Black Widow.

Alex stepped back as the last of the wire fell to the floor. Natasha stood up, flexing her hands to get the circulation back.

"Thanks." She said shortly. Then she slapped him.

Alex stumbled back a step, putting a hand to his cheek. Normally he would have been able to dodge a blow like that, but he was so surprised that it got through his defenses. He pulled his hand away to see that he was bleeding. He blinked at the blood before glaring at Natasha.

"What was that for?"

"Do you have any idea what kind of risk you just took?" Natasha growled, fury filling every line of muscle in her body. "What would you have done if you hadn't been able to kill him on the first blow?"

Alex shrugged. "I dunno. Kept trying? It seemed worth the risk to get untied."

"It wasn't!" Nat yelled. "Do you have any idea what he would have done to you if you lost that fight?"

"Well… yeah. That was kind of the point." Alex was kind of pissed that Nat was being so weird about this. He refused to believe that she had never done anything similar. "I mean, come on. Surely you've used your body on a mission before, whether for information or to distract someone, or something. How is this any different?"

"It's different because I'm a full grown woman who knows what she's getting herself into!"

Alex snorted. "Well, if my inexperience is what's bothering you, then relax. I'm not exactly a virgin anymore."

"What?" Clint sounded way more horrified than Alex thought the situation called for. He huffed, annoyed.

"Look, is this really the best place to be discussing this?" He asked. "I mean, we are in the middle of enemy territory here. We should probably go."

"No, we are discussing this now." Natasha snarled, grabbing Alex by the arm and yanking him away from the door. "If we wait until we get back to Avenger Tower, you'll just disappear every time we try to bring it up. At least here I can keep you in one place."

Alex winced. Nat was right, that was exactly what he had been planning to do. He  _ really  _ didn't want to have this conversation. But looking at Clint and Nat's stony faces, he knew there was no avoiding this.

He groaned before sitting down on the floor. Clint and Natasha sat down as well, fixing him with stern looks.

"Explain."

Alex rubbed his forehead. He wasn't really sure where to start. He usually just tried not to think about this aspect of his life.

"I guess it started when I was eight. At least, that's how old I was when I… the first time. I was walking home from school when some guy grabbed me and pulled me into an alleyway. I tried to fight him off, but he was huge and I was  _ eight.  _ There wasn't anything I could do in the end."

Alex leaned against the wall, laughing bitterly.

"You know what the funny thing is? When it was over, all I could think was how angry Ian was going to be that I was late getting home. I mean, I'd just been… well you know, and I was worried about missing my curfew."

Alex sighed, looking incredibly tired.

"I needn't have worried. When I got home, Ian was waiting for me, and I just knew that he already knew. Because of course he did. Ian knew about everything that happened in my life. He sat me down and told me that I was 'too pretty' and that it was 'bound to happen eventually' and that I 'needed to get used to it.' Then he taught me all the tricks, how to relax my body, how to submit, how to make it hurt less. And damn him to hell, his advice has saved my life.

"But the most important thing he taught he was that it didn't matter. That I shouldn't let it bother me, because it was just sex, you know? Just another way for someone to hurt me, not special in any way. No need to get all hung up on it. And it took awhile, but I got over it. Which has been… useful."

Alex paused, glancing at the assassins to see how they were taking his story. Clint looked like he was about to throw up, and Alex was pretty sure Natasha was planning hypothetical murders in her head. He looked away. He decided he didn't want to know how they were reacting.

"Then there was Yassen."

The tension in the room, already incredibly high, got even worse. Alex hesitated for a moment before continuing.

"Ian… he taught me how to survive it. Yassen… he taught he how to make it good."

Clint made an odd strangled noise, but Alex ignored it and forged on ahead.

"He taught me the tricks of the trade, how to flirt and wink and… other things. He made every aspect of me a weapon. I can use my smile to trick, intimidate, flatter, seduce, you name it. And sure, it's sucked a few times, but I'm still alive and they aren't, so whatever. It's fine."

"The fourth video."

Alex blinked at Nat's voice, pulled out of memories. "What?"

"The fourth training video." Natasha clarified. "The one you didn't want us to see. Was that..?"

"Ah, yes. That was the first time Yassen and I ever… did anything. It, uh, wasn't pretty. I didn't think you guys would want to see that."

"Because it does bother you." Natasha said bluntly.

Alex shook his head rapidly.

"No!" He denied. "It's just another skill set. That's all. I don't mind."

"You don't have to lie to us." Clint said quietly. "We aren't going to get mad at you."

"NO! You don't understand! I can't care!"

Alex was starting to lose control. He felt trapped in a way that had nothing to do with the room they were locked in. He wanted out, away from this conversation, from this room, from his life. He'd never wanted any of this!

"Why not?" Natasha challenged. "Why are you so special that you don't have to care?"

"Because what was I supposed to do?" Alex screamed. He felt something deep inside of him snap and all of a sudden he was crying, full on sobbing in a way he hadn't in years.

"What was I supposed to do?" Alex repeated. "Tell my uncle that I had nightmares for a month afterwards? He would have beat me to within an inch of my life. Tell Yassen that I would rather die then let men use me like that? Do you know what he would have done to me? I didn't have any support! I was told to just get over it, so I did! I survived because the only other option was to let it destroy me, and what good would that have done?"

Alex took a deep breath, rubbing away the tears angrily. He glared at the stunned spies.

"I know what you all think of me, but I will not apologize for who I am or what I have become. I am alive! I survived, through everything that they threw at me, and I would do it all again because if I gave up they would win. And I will  _ never  _ give them the satisfaction of breaking me. They can take everything from me, but they will never win as long as I keep going. So you know what? You can take your opinions and go straight to hell, because I don't care what you think. I don't care because I ‘think I'm special’, I don't care because if I dwelled on every terrible thing that has ever happened to me, I would go insane. So piss off."

Alex stood up and stormed over to the corner of the room. He took deep breath and tried to collect himself. After a couple of minutes, he managed to calm his tears. He rubbed his arms, trying to rid himself of the strange itching he could feel along his skin.

When he felt a bit more together, he walked back to Natasha and Clint. The two hadn't moved since his outburst. He approached cautiously.

"I'm sorry for my outburst." He mumbled. "It won't happen again."

"You don't have to apologize for crying." Clint said, looking almost pained.

"Crying is a waste of time and energy that would be better spent fixing the problem that caused you to cry in the first place." Alex said dully, not raising his gaze from the floor.

Clint opened his mouth as though he wanted to argue, but he deflated.

"You know what, never mind." He muttered, getting to his feet. "Let's just get out of here."

Alex nodded, brightening at the prospect of escaping. He really wanted to forget that the past half hour had ever happened.

"But." Natasha put in. "We are not done discussing this."

Alex frowned. "I don't see what else there is to talk about."

"Alex. I know that you didn't have anyone before, but you do now. And no matter what you say, I know that it does bother you. So we are going to come back to this, and we're going to help you. Alright?"

Alex found himself swallowing back more tears. Help him? Everyone who had ever tried to help him was dead. He wasn't sure he wanted to take the risk.

But… Clint and Nat were so… nice to him. And they were world famous assassins. They probably wouldn't die easily. Maybe… maybe it would be okay. Afterall, he had been living with the Avengers for four months now, and they had never hurt him. If anyone could help him, it would be them.

Pushing the last of his reservations aside, Alex nodded. After all, what was the worst that could happen?


End file.
